RJ and Makay

The last three years has been rough for banks, securities firms and insurers—even rougher for the analysts who predict how stocks of these firms will perform, Bloomberg Markets reports in its November issue.

The financial system unraveled in the second half of 2007. The market for securities backed by subprime mortgages collapsed. And by the second half of 2008, stock markets around the world were in rapid decline. Then, starting in March 2009, stocks roared back in the most powerful rally since the 1930s.

Daniel Harris, a financial services analyst at Goldman Sachs Group Inc., doesn’t remember when things were normal.