Ground Floor: According to most capitalists, the market, with all of its flaws, is still nearly perfect.

And we're talking about any market here, from a basic fruit and vegetable stall (like my grandmother ran for most of her life) to high-spec dealing rooms where financial products are hurled around like used cabbages (it was clearly in the genes somewhere).

There can, of course, be speculative bubbles where things are temporarily imperfect but the truth of it is - as we have found out - those bubbles eventually burst and the market reassess the value of the product it trades.

No matter what lessons have been learned over the past few years, they will eventually be forgotten in the search for fortune as everyone looks for a slice of the next great thing.

But while we're waiting, there are still plenty of bets to be made as people want to hedge or take risk in the markets already available.

That's why places such as the Chicago Mercantile Exchange came up with a whole host of products to buy and sell: from the earthy lean hogs, live cattle and frozen pork bellies to the less-expected but regularly traded weather futures, which are based on heating degree days and cooling degree days in a basket of US cities.

The information provided by the Chicago Mercantile Exchange for all your trading needs is immense. For example, if you do want to trade weather futures, you can download weather strategy papers, monthly aggregate weather files, daily historic weather data, daily year-to-date weather data - just about everything you could possibly need to know about the weather (except, perhaps, whether or not you need to bring a brolly with you when you're nipping out for a lunchtime sandwich).

You can learn a whole heap about frozen orange juice and hogs too, if that's what you are into.

It must have been this Aladdin's chest of available information that tipped Admiral John M Poindexter into sanctioning an initiative called the Policy Analysis Market. This potential trading tool has been the subject of front page news of late and most of you will probably have read about it already, but it's still a fascinatingly macabre concept from the people who believe that big business knows best.

The concept is now as obvious as weather futures or those lean hogs. A traded market would be set up to speculate on economic and political events in the Middle East, which would include terrorist attacks and assassinations.

US senators nearly had apoplexy when they learned of the plan and it is, without doubt, a horrible notion.

The question for the somewhat beleaguered intelligence services in the US is whether or not it would have been a more accurate predictor of events than their current set-up.

The markets can be extremely accurate in its assessment of future events. (In fact you can tie in the weather futures with frozen orange juice contracts if you want because, apparently, you get a more accurate prediction of Florida weather from the price movements of the OJ contracts than the meteorological office.)

I am somewhat more sceptical about the idea of a group of Wall Street suits discussing the merits of AK47s over other "ordnance" but I'm sure they'd eventually get up to speed.

However, when you're betting money on probable outcomes there's a natural tendency for you to want them to work in your favour, which is why there were plenty of people thinking that the Policy Analysis Market could have the side effect of enticing people to commit acts of terrorism.

Far-fetched it may be but, as we have discovered in recent years, the lure of mammon can cause people to commit unthinkable crimes. Anyway, the plug was pulled as soon as the whole thing came to light and so, if you access the original site (www.policyanalysis.org), all you see is an empty space.

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I'm not sure whether any empty desks will result from the Institute of Chartered Accountants in Ireland's (ICAI's) investigations into the behaviour of some of its members following the McCracken tribunal report. The ICAI has rebuked a couple of firms for their behaviour.

An ICAI rebuke is a bit like a stockbroker's research document. There are nuances with which you have to be familiar to understand fully the reprimand or censure involved.

As with the meaning behind "strong hold" and "weak hold", you have to get to grips with the concept of reprimand, severe reprimand or fine. (The fine doesn't exceed €30,000 which, in the context of accountancy fees, seems pretty derisory.)

According to the ICAI website, it can also withdraw practising rights, suspend the firm concerned or (as it says itself) implement the ultimate sanction, which is exclusion from membership - although heaven knows what you have to do to have membership revoked.

All this is done by a 12-person complaints committee, headed by a secretary who can call in a special investigator - who can do nothing, make a consent order or refer the matter to a 15-member disciplinary committee.

When a complaint comes before the disciplinary committee, the chairman (a step up from a secretary?) appoints a tribunal. I'm not sure why you need a 15-member disciplinary committee to set up a three-member tribunal but this is accountancy, where one and two can make whatever you like!

Anyway, if the worst comes to the worst, you can always go to the appeals committee.

As anyone who knows me will confirm, I am not a fan of committees. I can't remember who first came up with the comment that the best committee consists of three people, two of whom are absent, but whoever it was, was absolutely correct.

It still sounds like self-regulation at its worst - and, for what it's worth, I'm not a fan of self-regulation either.