The people in charge of the economy are captains of economics, using science and precision to guide the lives of millions....right? Perhaps not, says our very own Sir Don:

The stock market would have collapsed and banks forced to raise interest rates by 50 percent had the government not stepped in with HK$120 billion in 1998 to force speculators to retreat, said Chief Executive Donald Tsang Yam-kuen...Many foreign speculators had expected us to fight till the Hang Seng Index had climbed to 10,000 points, but we decided to make a sudden halt at 7,800, which was proposed by [Monetary Authority chief executive] Joseph Yam Chi-kwong and Hui, who insisted such a move would give us good luck as the Hong Kong dollar is pegged to the greenback at HK$7.80."...

"We only intended to fight the vultures by going back to step one. Norman Chan, Rafael Hui and I are all superstitious about 7.8 as our lucky number, where our US peg-link stays and our index finally hit rock bottom at 7,800.