Pointing the Finger

James Grant, editor of the widely read Grant's Interest Rate Observer, said past financial panics show that increased regulation is an unlikely cure. And while many people might be deserving of blame, Grant said he'd be careful to assign it.

"Capital markets are great amphitheaters of human action," he said. "I admit it's not very helpful to say that humanity is really at fault in this. But markets test extremes, they test limits. They test limits to the upside or the downside."

(Additional reporting by Jennifer Ablan, Walden Siew and Tim McLaughlin)