The Globe and Mail

U.S. borrowers, give thanks to an unlikely hero: Jerome Kerviel.
As you revel in the lower interest charges on your line of credit following Tuesday's big Fed rate cut, think of how one brave Frenchman came to your rescue, slashing the vig on that new 52-inch flat screen to something a little more manageable (though you'll have to find a new place to hang it post foreclosure).
Mr. Kerviel, of course, is the Societe Generale trader who managed to get offside to the tune of $7.1-billion (U.S.) on equity futures thanks to a wrong-way bet that stocks would rise. SocGen ended up unwinding all the misbegotten trades on Monday, putting immense pressure on the futures market, and no doubt contributing in a big way to Monday's slump in world stock markets.
The chain reaction looks something like this. Traders see the plunge in futures amid massive and mysterious selling, and even though the U.S. markets are closed for Martin Luther King Day, they start selling everything else.
The sell orders in an illiquid market cause shocks. The TSX falls 600 points and other markets around the globe swoon. Things look even worse for Tuesday's U.S. market opening.
To head off the worst of the disaster, Ben Bernanke steps into the breach with a 75 basis point rate cut Tuesday morning.
Et voila, Jerome Kerviel is a friend of overstretched borrowers all across the U.S. of A.
Maybe this will finally make people forget about Freedom Fries.