Confidence is high in the US thanks to strong vaccination rates. What will the new normal look like though? Offices could re-open by summer, but how much will we continue to work from home? And how much will we travel for business? Supply chains are still bottlenecked, leading to inflation pressure. The blockage of the Suez Canal won’t help that
Vaccines continue to be administered and supply will likely open up, even more, starting in April. Consumers have been dreaming of a return to normal and we appear to be at the cusp. The result of vaccination could be an explosion of pent-up demand for hardest-hit industries and a much better second half than people expect. Still, strong demand is putting pressure on supply chains and creating inflationary pressures. Given that stimulus is dependent on a K-shaped recovery, normalization could bring its own economic disruptions.
Succinct Summary: There were a lot of major data points about the economy last week but the biggest news of all seemed to be just how well tech companies did despite the massive economic dislocation. In a quarter where GDP fell at a 33% annualized rate, Apple managed to grow revenue by 11%! Stimulus probably played some role in tech companies’ strong performance, but beyond the stimulus is the fact that COVID has pushed everyone to spend even more time at home and on the internet. The behavioral shifts appear to be long-lasting too. 20 years after the dot com bubble, the internet is still not done reshaping society.
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Succinct Summary: The decline in economic activity has been huge and the recovery may take longer than expected. However, bulls are betting on massive stimulus in an environment that was already highly liquid prior to the Covid crisis. Consumers are itching to get back to normal and some hard hit industries are seeing stabilizing trends. But the economy is subject to the machinations of non-economic forces: governments and a poorly understood disease.
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Succinct Summary: The consumer is strong but manufacturing is weak. Everyone is tired of Brexit and tech IPOs probably still have a path to market as long as they have a path to profitability.