Seeking Alpha (May 8)
“Sweden is following Switzerland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic in easing monetary policy for the first time since hiking cycles began in 2022, when inflation surfaced in the aftermath of the COVID pandemic.” The quarter point cut of the overnight rate by the Riksbank makes “it more likely that the ECB will also jump on the bandwagon. The shift is noteworthy to global investors as it highlights the current central bank divergence taking place across the world.”
Tags: Aftermath, Central bank, Covid, Czech Republic, Easing, ECB, Global investors, Hungary, Inflation, Monetary policy, Pandemic, Riksbank, Sweden, Switzerland
Wall Street Journal (January 30)
“Logistics technology companies are cutting costs and slashing staff as a prolonged slump in freight stretches into 2024.” After soaring to “huge valuations during the Covid pandemic when a wave of consumer spending pushed freight volumes and shipping rates to record levels,” high interest rates and weak freight volumes are now “stretching some companies to their limit.”
Tags: Companies, Consumer spending, Costs, Covid, Freight volumes, Logistics, Pandemic, Prolonged, Shipping rates, Slashing, Slump, Staff, Technology, Valuations
Wall Street Journal (March 13)
“For the second time in 15 years (excluding the brief Covid-caused panic), regulators will have encouraged a credit mania, and then failed to foresee the financial panic when the easy money stopped.” Other banks may be exposed to the duration risk that brought down Silicon Valley Bank (SVB), “as last week’s selloff in regional bank stocks shows…. Something like 85% to 90% of SVB’s deposits are uninsured. The worry is that depositors in other banks will now flee.”
Tags: 15 years, Banks, Covid, Credit mania, Deposits, Duration risk, Easy money, Exposed, Financial panic, Regulators, Selloff, Silicon Valley Bank, Uninsured
Oilprice.com (January 22)
“Since China doesn’t report crude oil inventories, it’s all guesswork as to just how much crude the country has stashed over the past year.” Rising inventory levels “could mean that China’s imports may not be as strong as anticipated. But it could also mean that refiners are preparing for a surge in demand” in the post-Covid restriction era. “There is one certainty in the oil markets – the economic growth in China has been and will continue to be a key factor in global oil demand, capable of moving oil prices in either direction.”
Tags: China, Covid, Crude oil, Demand, Economic growth, Guesswork, Imports, Inventories, Prices, Refiners, Strong, Surge
Newsweek (January 4)
“For all its love of control, the Chinese leadership appears to have condemned its public to relive the uncertainty of early 2020, when Western capitals couldn’t grasp the spread of COVID. For those hoping to track the country’s first nationwide outbreak, it’s nothing short of a guessing game.”
Tags: 2020, Condemned, Control, Covid, Leadership, Nationwide, Outbreak, Public, Relive, Spread, Uncertainty
New York Times (December 28)
“China’s hospitals were already overcrowded, underfunded and inadequately staffed in the best of times. But now with Covid spreading freely for the first time in China, the medical system is being pushed to its limits.”
Tags: China, Covid, Hospitals, Inadequate, Medical system, Overcrowded, Spreading, Staff, Underfunded
Washington Post (December 21)
“China’s new covid nightmare could become a global catastrophe. The absence of a coherent fallback strategy” not only “threatens a fresh set of nightmares for its population, its economy and the Communist Party leadership. A new crisis could shake the whole world. As the Wuhan outbreak demonstrated three years ago, what begins in China does not necessarily stay there.”
Tags: China, Communist party, Covid, Crisis, Economy, Fallback strategy, Global catastrophe, Leadership, Nightmare, Outbreak, Population, Threatens, Wuhan
Bloomberg (December 13)
“A sharp increase in China’s Covid infections following an abrupt end to strict pandemic control measures suggests investors may need to pare back on reopening trades, according to Morgan Stanley.”
Tags: Abrupt, China, Covid, End, Infections, Investors, Morgan Stanley, Pandemic control, Pare, Reopening trades, Sharp increase, Strict
The Guardian (August 22)
“England currently feels like an eerie, unpoliced, ungoverned, unstable country after a coup. One government is gone but another hasn’t replaced it, and opposition cannot rise to the challenge.” A macro analyst recently wrote that the UK increasingly looks like “an emerging market country…. Brexit coupled with Covid and high inflation have succeeded…. The UK economy is crushed.”
Tags: Analyst, Brexit, Challenge, Coup, Covid, Economy, Eerie, Emerging market, England, Government, Inflation, Opposition, UK, Ungoverned, Unpoliced, Unstable
CNN (August 12)
“Hong Kong has recorded its sharpest annual drop in population,” falling from “7.41 million people to 7.29 million, a 1.6% decrease.” Experts attribute the exodus to “strict Covid control measures and a political crackdown that have taken the shine off a financial hub long advertised as ‘Asia’s world city.’”
Tags: 1.6% decrease, Annual, Asia, Control measures, Covid, Drop, Exodus, Experts, Financial hub, Hong Kong, Political crackdown, Population, Strict
