ShareholdersUnite Forums - Market comment 2020

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Quote:Italians admitted to hospital for coronavirus are getting younger, a health official has claimed. “The type of patient is changing,” Luca Lorini, the head of anaesthesia and intensive care at a northern Italian hospital, has said. “They are a bit younger, between 40 to 45 years old and the cases are more complicated.” Dr Lorini, who works at a hospital in Bergamo, told radio programme RaiNews24: ”People are arriving who got ill six or seven days ago and treated themselves at home – and then their conditions became more and more critical.” Twelve per cent of those who have been treated in intensive care are aged between 19 and 50, according to official figures released last week. Around 52 per cent are between 51 and 70 years old, with the rest all over 70.

Coronavirus: More young patients being admitted to hospital, Italian doctor warns | The Independent

Quote:The legislation passed by the House doesn’t actually guarantee paid sick leave to most American workers. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Friday night celebrated the coronavirus legislation that passed early Saturday as providing paid sick leave to American workers affected by the pandemic. She neglected to mention the fine print. In fact, the bill guarantees sick leave only to about 20 percent of workers. Big employers like McDonald’s and Amazon are not required to provide any paid sick leave, while companies with fewer than 50 employees can seek hardship exemptions from the Trump administration. “If you are sick, stay home,” Vice President Mike Pence said at a news conference on Saturday afternoon. “You’re not going to miss a pay check.” But that’s simply not true.

Sick workers should stay home, but there is no guarantee in the emergency legislation that most of them will get paid. The White House and congressional Republicans, who insisted on the exemptions as the price of bipartisan support for the legislation, bear the primary responsibility for the indefensible decision to prioritize corporate profits in the midst of a public health emergency. But House Democrats also failed to act in the public interest. Paying sick workers to stay at home is both good policy and good politics. Why not pass a bill that required all employers to provide paid sick leave and then force Republicans to explain their objections to the public?

The bill does require some employers to provide full-time workers with up to 10 days of paid leave. But the requirement does not apply to the nation’s largest employers — companies with 500 or more workers, who together employ roughly 54 percent of all workers. The legislation also provides some compensation for workers who need to take longer leaves under the Family and Medical Leave Act — but this too excludes workers at big companies. And the bill allows the Labor Department to grant hardship exemptions to businesses with fewer than 50 employees. That category includes another 26 percent of the work force, meaning that fully 80 percent of workers may not be able to cash in on Ms. Pelosi’s rhetoric.

Democrats began this process in the right place. The first draft of the coronavirus legislation included a permanent change requiring employers to allow every worker to earn up to seven days of paid sick leave, and a temporary change allowing any worker to take up to 10 days of sick leave during a public health emergency. The final draft includes only a pale shadow of those sensible requirements.

Opinion | There’s a Giant Hole in Pelosi’s Coronavirus Bill - The New York Times

Quote:Mark Gallagher, a consultant cardiologist, is at home with a temperature of 38 and is pretty certain he has Covid-19. But the NHS will not test him for it. Instead, he has paid for a test kit from a private UK clinic and a colleague in China is sending him another. Gallagher has been in and out of his London hospital every day for the last 28 in a row. In the last couple of weeks he saw maybe 70 people in outpatients, he said. He cannot understand why the NHS will not test him or other healthcare workers, who are put at risk by their work and risk infecting other vulnerable patients in turn, as well as their families. “The policy is that I don’t need to be tested and even the people who have been in contact with me aren’t going to be tested,” he said.

“They are abandoning the basic principles for dealing with an epidemic, which are to test whenever possible, trace contacts and contain. Almost all individual physicians I know feel that what they are doing is wrong.” Last week, a woman of 79 was admitted to his care for an elective, non-urgent procedure. She was then diagnosed with Covid-19, which, he says, “she almost certainly acquired on our wards”. She was put on a ventilator but died on Monday night. “I’m sure she will go down as an elderly patient with underlying conditions, but she should have lived to 90,” he said. “Approximately 50 nurses dealt with her and many doctors. None has been tested. All are still at work.”

‘There is a policy of surrender’: doctor on UK’s Covid-19 failures | World news | The Guardian

Quote:What we have found in this data is that adults aged 20-50 make most of their contacts in workplaces. If those of us who can work remotely start doing so now, it will contribute to lowering overall transmission in the population. Another important finding is that people over 65 – who are particularly at risk from severe Covid-19 illness – make over half of their contacts in other settings (not home, school or work), such as shops, restaurants and leisure centres.

By avoiding these interactions, people who are most at risk from the new coronavirus could halve their risk of infection. By changing our behaviour now, and sustaining these changes throughout the outbreak, we can significantly reduce our own risk of infection, and the risk to others, and by doing so help protect those most vulnerable. Sustainability is key here; these measures may reduce the reproduction number R, but as soon as they are lifted we could see transmission again, and another outbreak.

What we scientists have discovered about how each age group spreads Covid-19 | Petra Klepac | Opinion | The Guardian

Quote:President Donald Trump’s plan to send $1,000 to every American, part of emergency stimulus of as much as $1.2 trillion to contain the economic hit from the coronavirus, is unlikely to stop a U.S. recession. The administration announced plans Tuesday to send the direct payments in coming days following several weeks of pressure from investors, economists, left-leaning think tanks and Republicans such as Utah Senator Mitt Romney. The stimulus will help replenish bank accounts amid widespread firings, closures and foregone pay, and may help with the eventual economic recovery. But several analysts say even with such sweeping measures the world’s largest economy won’t be able to avoid a contraction.

Those $1,000 Checks Can’t Stop the Now-Inevitable U.S. Recession - Bloomberg

That wasn't so hard, we called that two weeks ago.

Quote:Ray Dalio, founder of hedge fund Bridgewater Associates, has said corporations in the United States will lose as much as $4 trillion due to the economic damage from coronavirus outbreak. The Trump administration is pushing for a package of some $1.3 trillion in aid to help businesses and individual Americans devastated by the virus, which Dalio said on Thursday should be nearly doubled. The fiscal stimulus package should be $1.5 trillion to $2 trillion as a minimum, depending on the form of the financial relief such as loan guarantees and credits, Dalio told CNBC in an interview. 'We're in an economic downturn. What you're seeing is the inability of central banks to stimulate monetary policy in a way that is normal,' Dalio said in the interview.

Restaurants have felt the hit more than most, after more than 20 states have so far ordered them to close down to customers. Local sites are desperately trying to survive by offering takeout and delivery options, which are still permitted under the orders. Sobering statistics from the National Restaurant Association warn that $225 billion sales could be lost over the next three months, meaning around seven million jobs could be lost in the industry alone. Around 15.6 million people work in the industry in the US leaving around half out of jobs and struggling to make ends meet. Restaurants are already reporting a fall in business by 70 percent, and it's the upscale and fine dining establishments which have been hardest hit. Celebrity chef Tom Colicchio said this week he had to lay off 300 people at his New York Crafted Hospitality restaurant group, which includes popular eateries Temple Court and Riverpark. The news followed an announcement from New York City restaurant giant Union Square Hospitality Group on Wednesday that it had been forced to lay off 2,000 workers or 80 percent of the company's workforce.

Ray Dalio predicts US companies will lose $4 TRILLION in coronavirus recession | Daily Mail Online

Quote:Still, Bank of America as a firm doesn’t see a big rebound. The bank cut its year-end target on the S&P 500 to 2,600 from 3,100, which would translate into a nearly 20% loss for the full-year 2020 and is only about 4.5% higher from current levels. The new outlook represents the most bearish view on Wall Street, according to the CNBC Market Strategist Survey that rounds up 16 top strategists’ forecasts. The outlook reflects the bank’s U.S. GDP forecast of a 7.7% drop this year, which would mark the worst post-war recession in history. The firm also expects the S&P 500 earnings per share to tumble 29% this year as the pandemic wreaks havoc on corporate profits.

Bank of America says the lows for stock prices and corporate bonds are in

Quote:We present a theory of Keynesian supply shocks: supply shocks that trigger changes in aggregate demand larger than the shocks themselves. We argue that the economic shocks associated to the COVID-19 epidemic—shutdowns, layoffs, and firm exits—may have this feature. In one-sector economies supply shocks are never Keynesian. We show that this is a general result that extend to economies with incomplete markets and liquidity constrained consumers. In economies with multiple sectors Keynesian supply shocks are possible, under some conditions. A 50% shock that hits all sectors is not the same as a 100% shock that hits half the economy. Incomplete markets make the conditions for Keynesian supply shocks more likely to be met. Firm exit and job destruction can amplify the initial effect, aggravating the recession. We discuss the effects of various policies. Standard fiscal stimulus can be less effective than usual because the fact that some sectors are shut down mutes the Keynesian multiplier feedback. Monetary policy, as long as it is unimpeded by the zero lower bound, can have magnified effects, by preventing firm exits. Turning to optimal policy, closing down contact-intensive sectors and providing full insurance payments to affected workers can achieve the first-best allocation, despite the lower per-dollar potency of fiscal policy

-1cmMacroeconomic Implications of COVID-19: Can Negative Supply Shocks Cause Demand Shortages?1cm

Quote:A growing number of economists are also losing hope that the collapse will be followed by a swift recovery. According to one analysis by Deutsche Bank, many companies and households will at first save money to pay off debts they have accumulated in the crisis. Analysts at the bank believe this would result in the economy taking not a V shape, but a U-shaped curve, meaning the collapse will be followed by a period of stagnation before growth starts again. New York University economics expert Nouriel Roubini believes even that is optimistic. He has recently begun speaking of an "I” scenario, a vertical, nearly uninterrupted decline in the economy, without any recovery in sight. Some economists fear that the corona crisis could spell the end of American economic dominance. Harvard University’s Kenneth Rogoff argues that, even though we shouldn’t underestimate the U.S.’s ability to creatively overcome adversity, it is unclear if it will succeed this time. He says that the pandemic could "prove to be the greatest threat to U.S. leadership and primacy of the dollar since World War II."

The American Patient: How Trump Is Fueling a Corona Disaster - DER SPIEGEL

Quote:First, there’s evidence that the main reason people are staying at home is not lockdowns but the threat of the virus itself. Data from online restaurant-reservation websites shows that in major cities, most of the decline in restaurant attendance happened before stay-at-home orders were issued. And polls indicate that most Americans are very wary of returning to their normal activities. This means that unless virus suppression regimes give people confidence that coronavirus isn’t a threat to their personal safety, they’re unlikely to come out and shop even if the government says there's no need to worry. Because effective treatments probably won’t be available at least until the fall or later, that means many more months of business devastation except in the few competent and lucky places that get test-and-trace systems in place..

How Bad Might It Get? Think the Great Depression

"Opening up" the economy isn't even likely to work..

Quote:But on Friday, the entire country reported just 16 new cases, a sharp decline from a peak of 460 new infections on March 28. Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said Friday the National Cabinet will meet on May 8 to consider easing lockdown measures, bringing forward the discussion from the week beginning May 11. "Australians have earned an early mark," Morrison said. "We need to restart our economy, we need to restart our society." In some states, the curve has completely flattened: Queensland hasn't reported any new cases since Monday, and South Australia has seen no new infections for more than a week. "No more cases in South Australia. This is a landmark for us," South Australia Chief Public Health Officer Nicola Spurrier said with a big smile during a press briefing on Wednesday.

How did Australia flatten its coronavirus curve? Restrictions easing as infection rate continues to fall - CNN

Quote:Fewer than one in five of the British public believe the time is right to consider reopening schools, restaurants, pubs and stadiums. The findings, in a new poll for the Observer, suggest Boris Johnson will struggle to convince people to return their lives to normal if he tries to ease the lockdown soon.

Fearful Britons remain strongly opposed to lifting lockdown | World news | The Guardian

Quote:But Belgium’s high numbers have less to do with the spread of the disease and more to do with the way it counts fatalities. Its figures include all the deaths in the country’s more than 1,500 nursing homes, even those untested for the virus. These numbers add up to more than half of the overall figure.

Why Belgium has the highest coronavirus death rate in the world | The Independent

Quote:A recent Deloitte survey asked people in select countries whether they agree with the statement: “I feel safe going to the store right now.” In the US, only 34% of those surveyed responded with “agree” or “strongly agree.” This mindset is likely in line with what many retailers expected as they come up with strategies to reopen stores while encouraging hygiene and social distancing..

Only one-third of American consumers say they'd feel safe going to a store right now as states start to reopen nonessential businesses

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