In the immediate wake of the events in Charlottesville, Wall Street had a strong opening Aug. 14. It was a classic bounce-back from a week where reports from North Korea pushed the Dow Jones Industrial Average down from its 22,200 high to the Friday close of 21,858. The early rise of 140 Dow points retraced about half those losses.

Then, Merck & Co., Inc. (NYSE:MRK) CEO Kenneth Frazier resigned from a federal manufacturing council over the weekend’s events, and President Donald Trump reacted with a tweet that left analysts in shock, because it attacked both Frazier and the pharmaceutical industry over high prices.

In response, prices were not shaken. But will the economy be stirred?

The Merck Case

Frazier is a Democrat and his company’s political action committee contributed close to equally to both parties last cycle.

His decision to serve the Trump administration was comparable to former General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) CEO Jeff Immelt’s service to the Obama administration. Immelt is a lifelong Republican who came under severe criticism from conservatives over that decision. Frazier, who is African-American, was seated next to Trump in pictures of the council.

None of this should matter. MRK stock should be a buy, having delivered $3.5 billion in net income on $19.4 billion in revenue for the first six months, along with $3.8 billion in operating cash flow. Merck has done this while keeping its price increases to the mid-single digits when discounts are included in the calculation.

There are “bad actors” among drug companies, in terms of pricing, but Merck is not one of them. The attack by the president was personal.

An Economy Without Policy

Frazier is not alone. Tesla Inc (NASDAQ:TSLA) CEO Elon Musk and Walt Disney Co. (NYSE:DIS) CEO Bob Iger previously left Trump boards, troubled by the direction of policy.

A president’s power is proportional to their popularity and performance. If Trump’s popularity means his power is declining, that could be bullish for stocks.

But stupid policy also yields stupid results.

Investors are desperate for something to invest in, the price of Bitcoin having tripled this year, up another 5% early on Aug. 14. Speculation is spilling outside the real economy, and the dollar index is down, meaning international investors are having their U.S. market gains wiped out when they try to bring them home.

Meanwhile U.S. GDP growth continues — the estimated GDP for the second quarter of 2017, $19.226 trillion, was up 3.2% on an annualized rate from the fourth quarter’s $18.905 trillion.

Absent policy change from Washington, the economy is taking its cues from a Federal Reserve discount rate that is up from 1% a year ago to 1.75% now and employment that continues growing without real wage growth.

The market is getting ahead of the economy.

What Comes Next

The big fear is what happens if we have real economic trouble, with a political establishment paralyzed, unable to respond.

There are a lot of policies now pointing to trouble. Discouraging tourism is bad for the economy. Letting crops rot in fields is bad, and keeping tech companies from hiring qualified people is also bad. Reacting with your heart instead of your head is a great way to lose money, but that’s just what the president is doing, so why should investors not be concerned?

Fear indices are starting to rise. The crypto-currency market’s market cap is now approaching $140 billion, with half of that being in Bitcoin. In the last decade, it was the rising price of gold that signaled trouble ahead.

Bitcoin is the new canary in the coal mine, and its price is the tweeting investors should be listening to.

Dana Blankenhorn is a financial and technology journalist. He is the author of the historical mystery romance The Reluctant Detective Travels in Time,  available now at the Amazon Kindle store. Write him at danablankenhorn@gmail.com or follow him on Twitter at @danablankenhorn. As of this writing, he did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.