Yes, the markets jumped when it seemed that Hillary had won – but they went back down because of The Donald

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In the end the Clinton bounce lasted a matter of minutes.

The FTSE 100 opened 40 points up, on the back of a winning performance from Hillary Clinton in the first Presidential debate.

Just over an hour later, it had given all those gains up as attention started to focus on the other big bogeyman stalking the markets: Deutsche Bank, its potential to ignite a fresh banking crisis, and the continuing uncertainty over whether Angela Merkel has the political capital to bail it out with German taxpayers’ capital if the worst happens.

The prospect of both of them at once has the markets running for cover and investors looking into buying gold, or at least checking whether there’s enough empty space under the bed for a sack full of cash. The precious metal has had one of its most successful years since 1980, which tells you all you need to know.

But Clinton won. So that’s all right then. Kick her a couple of extra million to buy some ads, and common sense will surely prevail, right? Right?

Don’t be so sure.

Hilary Clinton has consistently outspent Trump, but he has been able to bridge the gap with an unprecedented amount of free media coverage.

He has used it to try and portray himself as the outsider, which doesn’t ring at all true given his place in America’s moneyed elite – even if, as Clinton pointed out, we don’t know how much money he actually has because of his refusal to release his tax returns.

But he is surely the anti-establishment candidate, and seeming anti-establishment can be a winning strategy at a time of profound economic insecurity throughout the Western world. Just look at the success of Trump’s new best bud Nigel Farage, and his snarling coterie of bellicose Brexiteers on this side of the Atlantic.

At a time of uncertainty you would think people would reach for the safety of the familiar and the safe. This is what has happened in the past.

Clinton is familiar and safe. We know who she is, what she is, and what she will do. Despite the portrayal of her as a left-wing radical on the wilder shores of the conspiracy-obsessed and gun-toting right, she’s a moderate who will seek to work across the aisle from the White House, if that is at all possible in a partisan US Congress that values ideological purity above common sense.

Yet that is her biggest problem. That is what the establishment of which she is part wants, but that establishment has never truly recovered from the banking crisis, the bail-outs, and the fact that no banker was ever prosecuted for bringing down the global economy. Populist politicians promising to tear it all up in the name of “the people” have become hugely in vogue as a result. Which helps to explain Donald J Trump.

It certainly appears that he lost the debate, which is why the market initially jumped out of bed with such a spring in its step. Reputable media sources called it for Clinton. The bookies called it for Clinton. Betway was fast out of the stalls with a press release saying it had cut the odds on a Clinton White House.

But did Trump lose and did Clinton win and, as one of my friends tweeted to me, does it actually matter?

Trump’s supporters have backed him through a series of scandals and controversies that would have been the death of any past presidential campaign.

That being the case, they will almost certainly still back him, regardless of his poor performance in last night’s debate.

The winner of a debate, anyway, very much depends on which way you lean. So of course we in the liberal media, and on the liberal side of the fence, are inclined to think Clinton won.

What matters, however, is what middle America thinks and how that translates into what it does at the ballot box.

It wasn’t just concerns over Deutsche Bank that caused the markets’ early optimism to vanish quicker than a Clayton Kershaw fastball (he’s a flame-throwing baseball pitcher, for the benefit of British readers).

It was their realisation that the debate might not matter. They fear Trump because he is so wildly unpredictable, even if a Democrat-controlled Senate emerges to frustrate his most damaging domestic plans.

They fear the election because it is also wildly unpredictable and the polls are still extremely close.

They are right to be afraid because this ain’t over – and while we think we know who won this first of three debates, we can’t be sure.