Is the VIX Going Up?

The market is disrespecting the tail. The out of the money puts on the S&P 500 just don't carry that much premium, certainly relative to other parts of what they call the volatility surface,. So the skew is very flat. There's a real potential here that something does break. And that's where illiquidity can really erode market fundamentals very quickly. It's hard for me to think that we can get through this without some fundamental downshift in corporate earnings.