Be careful what you wish for. For years, the City has been looking forward to the time when interest rates would recover to more normal levels, allowing them to make more money on deposits and lending. But firms hardly expected higher rates to be accompanied by political meltdown. Some may now feel a bit nostalgic for the bad old days.

On the surface, banks should be big beneficiaries of higher rates, allowing them to raise rates on lending by more than on deposits and boost bond trading revenue. The problem is that central banks are using higher rates as a weapon against soaring inflation, even at the cost of a nasty economic downturn.