Every year I tabulate the most-read posts in this space as I find this exercise to be an excellent way to identify the issues that readers are interested in and also to see how these issues evolve over time. These most-read posts also serve as easily accessible repositories of high-quality material for the benefit of new readers and long-term readers alike.

With the U.S. fiscal cliff negotiations going down to the wire, it is not surprising that fears related to the fiscal cliff topped the list of investor threats to the stock market for the eleventh week in a row in the VIX and More weekly fear poll.

A lot of strange things happened in the financial markets late on Friday afternoon and a good deal of the craziness was in the VIX futures market, with impacts felt in the likes of VXX, which jumped 11.6% in less than an hour (the last 40 minutes of the regular session and the first 14 minutes of after-hours trading.)

With little progress in the fiscal cliff negotiations, stocks have sold off and the VIX has spiked to its highest level since July. Is the fiscal cliff really what we should be worrying about? Make your voice heard regarding the #1 threat to stocks in the fear poll below and check back in on Monday when I publish the results and offer some commentary.