Europe’s economy will grow 3.8 percent this year and next, the European Commission has predicted. The figure for 2021 is lower than the commission’s previous forecast, due to ongoing COVID lockdowns as well as a slower-than-expected vaccination campaign. However, the 3.8-percent growth projection for 2022 is higher than the commission’s earlier expectation. Spain’s and France’s...
Tag: feb 16 2021
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TRADING VOLUMES REACH “FRENZIED” PACE
Over the 20 trading days ending 11 February, an average of 15.8 billion shares was traded on U.S. equity markets, Bloomberg reported. The number came close to the 20-day average of 16.1 billion shares reached last 25 March as the economy was crashing, panicked investors were dumping their portfolios, and opportunists were scooping up bargains....
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“REDDIT RALLY” HEARINGS IN CONGRESS LIKELY TO PROTECT WALL ST.
Congress is set to hold “Reddit Rally” hearings on 18 February, concerning the GameStop stock saga. The question is, will politicians go after big financial players with well-greased political connections or aim to make an example of the “little guy” retail traders on the WallStreetBets Reddit board who drove up stocks in early January? There’s...
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“NO FEE” TRADING APPS CHANGING THE FINANCIAL LANDSCAPE
Commission-fee trading on phone apps is transforming the stock industry, according to analysts. But they claim the new paradigm is creating trading frenzies and risk-taking that may net negatives. U.S. retail traders have shown their appetite, with rolling net inflows over the past 22 days into equities reaching $32bn, compared to $3bn two years ago,...
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PRIVATE EQUITY FIRM IN TALKS TO BUY ANOTHER HOSPITAL CHAIN
Nashville-based LifePoint Health, a company with 80 rural hospitals and owned by private equity firm Apollo Asset Management, is negotiating to buy Ardent Health Services, which operates 30 hospitals in six states. The deal would create a $10-billion hospital chain. Ardent operates acute-care hospitals in growing urban and suburban areas, mostly in Oklahoma and Texas. ...
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BIDEN KEEPS TRUMP TARIFFS ON EUROPEAN FOODS
The Biden administration will keep existing tariffs in place for now on some European wines, cheeses, and other foods, despite complaints by food-industry trade groups that the levies are raising costs for restaurants and consumers. The 25-percent tariffs were imposed on $7.5 billion worth of Europe’s goods in late 2019 by the Trump administration to...
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SALESFORCE.COM TO PERMANENTLY SHRINK ITS OFFICE SPACE
Software company Salesforce.com will expect at least 65 percent of its 54,000 employees to be in its corporate offices only one to three days a week after the COVID pandemic recedes, up from 40 percent now, the company has announced. As a result, it will permanently abandon an unspecified amount of office space in cities...
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COMPANIES DELAY RECALLING OFFICE WORKERS
Disappointed with the speed of the vaccine rollout, companies across America have canceled plans to recall employees to their offices this spring. Many businesses have rescheduled the returns for September or later or are refusing to set any date at all for regrouping. Qurate Retail has pushed back a May return date until September for...
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TRUCKING COMPANIES DECIMATED BY LOCKDOWNS
In 2020, 3,140 U.S. trucking businesses shut down, 185 percent more than in 2019, according to Broughton Capital. More than half of the failures took place in the year’s second quarter when the economy cratered as politicians locked down states’ economies in the face of the COVID pandemic. A record number of the closures occurred...