[Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1994, Book I)]
[March 31, 1994]
[Pages 567-568]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]



Exchange With Reporters in San Diego
March 31, 1994

Stock Market

    Q. Mr. President, can you tell us what's happening on the stock 
market?
    The President. Well, I've talked to Mr. Rubin this morning at some 
length, and he's obviously been making calls around the country.
    I'd just like to make two observations. One is that we have 
conducted, since the stock market began to fall, another exhaustive 
review of all the evidence we have and the opinions of everybody we can 
talk to around the country. No one believes that there is any serious 
reason to doubt, that there is any inflation in this economy, or that we 
won't have good growth this year. In other words, there is no underlying 
economic justification for any cause of concern or any increase in long-
term interest rates.
    There are a lot of people who have believed for some time--and it's 
been in the press a lot--that the stock market had a very rapid runup 
last year. It might have been a little bit too high, and maybe a lot of 
this is people just kind of working that out. But again, I say, I think 
it's very important that the American people remain confident that 
there's no inflation in the economy, that there's no reason that the 
economy shouldn't grow, that there's no reason we shouldn't have 2 
million more jobs.
    The stock market, like any kind of market, is subject to movements 
which may sometimes be a little more than is warranted by the economic 
circumstances one way or the other. We saw that often in the 1980's, 
when the stock market tripled in years when unemployment went up, when 
wages were stagnant, when the underlying economy didn't seem to justify 
it.
    So we've had a very good market; I'm very grateful for it. I hope 
that we'll rebound quickly, but the underlying economy is in good shape. 
And no one should make decisions based on a worry about some inflation 
factor they don't know about or some impending problem in some sector of 
the economy. Things, according to every single report I have, are still 
very solid for a solid economic growth.
    Q. Does that skittishness bother you, though, I mean whether it's 
warranted or not?
    The President. Let me just say this. I remember when it happened in 
1987, when there was more than skittishness, when there was a big drop 
there. No one could figure out exactly why it happened, and then after 
it happened the market began a steady rebuilding. What I'm trying to do 
is to reassure people so that we don't go beyond skittishness, because 
no one believes that there's a serious problem with an underlying 
American economy. It is healthy, and it is sound. Some of these 
corrective things will happen from time to time, but there's no reason 
for people to overreact to it. The real issue is, is our fundamental 
economy sound?
    Americans will be making these investment decisions all the time: 
Should they be in the stock market or should they be in CD's or should 
they be in something in between, you know? Should they change their 
stock portfolios? And there are a lot of things that have happened in 
the last few years which have increased the

[[Page 568]]

volume and intensity of trading in the stock market. Low interest rates 
put more people in the stock market because they couldn't earn big 
interest rates on fixed investments. So, a lot of these things just 
happen and change. I just think it's important that we not overreact to 
it.

Japanese Students

    Q. Mr. President, on the murders of those two Japanese students. 
Have you had a chance--they caught the two--they have two suspects in 
the murders of those two Japanese students. Have you had a chance to 
talk with the parents or with anyone involved in that? What do you 
think?
    The President. I called Prime Minister Hosokawa, and we talked about 
a number of things, but I--or excuse me, I sent him word and he called 
me, and we talked about a number of things. And I personally told him 
how regretful I was, and I apologized on behalf of our people that 
anyone would lose their lives here. And I have written to both the young 
men's parents personally, and I saw Chief Williams on television last 
night. I'm gratified that an arrest has been made. That's a real 
compliment to the law enforcement agents in Los Angeles. And I 
appreciate the effort that they've made.
    Thank you.

Note: The exchange began at 11:03 a.m. at the Zamorano Fine Arts 
Academy. During the exchange, the President referred to Takuma Eto and 
Go Matsura, Japanese students living in California who were murdered in 
a carjacking on March 25. A tape was not available for verification of 
the content of this exchange.