Author: Press Room

Since the start of the pandemic, the markets, especially the SPDR® S&P 500 ETF Trust (NYSEARCA:SPY) seem to be moving in sync with dollar liquidity characterized by the proxy for liquidity measured in its most popular form by the Total size of the Federal Reserve balance sheet minus the amounts “trapped” in the Treasury General account and the Reverse Repo facility of the Federal Reserve. I won’t go into the details of why dollar liquidity is so important for the evolution of asset inflation or deflation as this article would be excessively long but here you can find an excellent…

US health secretary Xavier Becerra said the Biden administration was weighing “every option” to fight a Texas judge’s “reckless” ruling that would withdraw approval for an abortion drug if upheld.Becerra said the decision by Texas federal judge Matthew Kacsmaryk would imperil women’s access to critical healthcare in America, as well as threaten the entire approval process of the US Food and Drug Administration.“What you saw by that one judge in that one court in that one state — that’s not America,” Becerra said on CNN on Sunday.“America goes by the evidence. America does what’s fair. America does what is transparent and…

Three years after the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, Americans’ views of the disease’s impact have stagnated into a complex set of mixed feelings, recent polling suggests, with few believing that the pandemic has ended but most also saying that their lives had returned mostly – if not entirely – to normal. The US Senate passed a bill last week that would end the national Covid-19 emergency declared in March 2020. The US House approved the measure earlier this year, and the White House has said President Joe Biden will sign it despite “strongly” opposing the bill. The administration had…

About the author: Reva Goujon is a macro geopolitical strategist and director for China Corporate Advisory at Rhodium Group.The urge to embrace an artificial intelligence-driven era of economic growth is colliding with state paranoia over data weaponization. It’s a combustible mix, stoking a geopolitical standoff between Beijing and Washington over whose data regulations reign supreme. But this cocktail could also compel a fundamental reset in the strategic competition between the U.S. and China. A pattern has emerged in recent years. Economists model how many percentage points of gross domestic product growth can be sourced from data flows to reinvigorate the…

Pay transparency doesn’t always help workers.  That’s one of the findings of a new working paper, distributed by the National Bureau of Economic Research, that examines pay-transparency policies over the past two decades. While policies that help workers compare pay across different companies can encourage them to seek better salaries or positions, policies that let workers compare pay within their company could lead to interpersonal conflict with peers or resentment about co-workers’ salaries, the paper said. And in a truly transparent workplace where co-workers are paid equally, pay transparency could eliminate room for pay negotiation. “If workers all get the…

The Federal Reserve will have to be nimble as it sets interest rates given the uncertainty facing the outlook, Richmond Fed President Tom Barkin said Thursday. “Most forecasts of our policy path seem to average the risk of higher inflation with the risk of further contagion in banking,” Barkin said in a speech to the Virginia Council of CEOs at the University of Richmond. “I see the range of potential outcomes as pretty wide,” Barkin added. In his comments about the sudden collapse of Silicon Valley Bank earlier this month, Barkin said that not every bank failure becomes Lehman Brothers…

4/4 © Reuters. The logo of Arquus, a unit of Volvo AB, is pictured at the production plant in Limoges, France, April 6, 2023. REUTERS/Benoit Tessier 2/4 By Clotaire Achi LIMOGES, France (Reuters) – French armoured truck maker Arquus, specialised in manufacturing high-tech off-road military vehicles, has gone back to producing more low-tech undercarriages for howitzers as the ground war in Ukraine boosts demand for artillery. Despite an industry trend towards more high-tech weaponry like drones and autonomous missiles, traditional battlefield equipment like tanks and howitzers such as France’s Caesar canons and U.S.-made HIMARS have helped bend the trajectory of…

By Alex Lawler LONDON (Reuters) – The surprise oil output cuts announced on Sunday by OPEC+ members illustrate their greater power over the market, given limited supply growth by other producers such as U.S. shale firms and still-growing demand despite the energy transition. Oil has jumped to $85 a barrel since members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and allies including Russia announced production cuts of about 1.16 million barrels per day (bpd), adding to curbs already in place. While OPEC or OPEC+ decisions to cut output in the past have drawn warnings that higher prices and lower…

By Saqib Iqbal Ahmed NEW YORK (Reuters) -The U.S. dollar fell to a 1-week low against the euro on Thursday as German inflation data helped lift the common currency and as concerns over the banking sector receded. Inflation eased significantly in Germany in March on the back of lower energy prices but was above forecasts, adding pressure on the European Central Bank to further tighten its monetary policy. Separately, data showed that Spain’s consumer prices rose 3.3% year-on-year in March, the slowest pace since the 12-month period through August 2021 and less than expected by analysts. The European Central Bank,…

By Doyinsola Oladipo NEW YORK (Reuters) – Most Millennial and Generation Z travelers are planning bigger 2023 travel budgets but also growing more cost-conscious when booking flights and hotel accommodations, according to travel booking app Hopper. Early this year, U.S. travel companies told investors they saw no signs of slowing demand despite rising costs, but now, Hopper said, more customers are booking travel only when the price is right. The trend may eventually hamper growth for airline, hotel and leisure companies that have benefited from rising prices and pent-up demand. Some 84% of Hopper users, primarily Millennial and Gen Z…