Compared to the drama of the previous week, markets were restrained, as US earnings settled nerves. The disruptor has been disrupted. Sears, Roebuck and Company was founded in 1892, selling a huge range of products by mail order:  bicycles, sewing machines, cars, then fridges, groceries and cooking stoves too. In short, Sears provided ordinary consumers with the capacity to order a huge range of affordable goods from home. Sound familiar? With the dazzling rise of Amazon in recent years, it certainly should do. But it is the rise of Amazon – and, in earlier years, Walmart – that best explains the fact that, last week, the queen of 20th century Read more…