Markets played their own version of the popular children’s game “Red Light, Green Light” during the fourth quarter.  After the Fed’s “higher for longer” forecast in September, both stock and bond markets swooned.  The S & P 500 briefly entered correction territory in October while the more interest rate sensitive Russell 2000, an index of small companies, corrected nearly 18% from its mid-summer high.  Bond yields spiked with the 10-year Treasury bond yield eclipsing 5% in mid-October.  These events caused a rapid tightening in financial conditions, a development that has historically preceded an eventual downturn in the economy.  Investors feared that to combat above-target inflation, the Fed would keep rates in restrictive territory for too long and resist responding to future economic weakness with policy easing.  This was the “red light.”