I’m sorry but people trot out correlation and causation without understanding that causation cannot be proven without proper controls for all other existing variables which is difficult if not impossible in the real world, and certainly not possible for the financial world where there are numerous variables, none of which can be fully controlled making anyone who discusses correlation and causation in that context sound like someone who read something smart off the internet once upon a time and just repeats it every time they see the word “correlation”.
What's your favorite text/review paper on causal inference? (It's been on my list of things to read up on for a couple years now).