LONDON (Reuters) – A drubbing in world equity markets and a huge flight to safety into U.S. Treasuries this week suggests investors now doubt that a much-anticipated return to post-COVID normality is feasible any time soon. Data from the United States and China, which account for more than half of world growth, suggests a slowdown in the recent blistering pace of the global economy alongside rising prices for all manner of goods and raw materials. Coinciding with a resurgence in the Delta variant of COVID-19, markets may be sending alarm signals about the global economic outlook, Deutsche Bank chief FX strategist George Saravelos told clients. “As prices have risen, the consumer has been cutting back demand rather than bringing forward consumption. This is the opposite of what one would expect if the environment was genuinely inflationary and it shows the global economy has a very low speed limit,” Saravelos wrote. That sentiment was evident in the latest flow data too. Bank of America Merill Lynch flagged “stagflation” concerns for the second half of 2021, noting slowing inflows into stocks and outflows from high-yield assets. Data on hedge funds’ weekly currency positioning is the closest available real-time indicator of investors’ thinking about the $6.6 trillion a day foreign exchange markets. With the dollar at its highest since end-March, latest Commodity Futures Trading Commission data shows net long positions on the dollar against a basket of major currencies is the biggest since March 2020. Positioning had dropped to a net short bet as recently as early June. Dollar appreciation against the euro and emerging market currencies is unsurprising given economic uncertainty, said Ludovic Colin, senior portfolio manager at Vontobel Asset Management. “Whenever Americans get worried about growth at home or globally, they repatriate money and buy dollars,” he added. In recent months, investors optimistic about an economic recovery sent a flood of cash into so-called cyclical sectors such as banks, leisure and energy. These are, in short, companies that benefit from an economic recovery. The tide may now be going out. Instead “growth” stocks, especially technology, has outperformed its value counterparts by more than 3 percentage points since the start of July. Many clients of Goldman Sachs believe the cyclical rotation was a short-lived phenomenon driven by recovery from an unusual recession, the bank said. Defensive stocks such as utilities are back in favour too. A basket of value stocks compiled by MSCI is testing its lowest levels for this year against defensive peers, having risen 11% in the first six months of 2021. Early this year, the dollar’s trajectory was determined by the interest rate differentials enjoyed by U.S. debt over its rivals, with correlations peaking in May. While real or inflation-adjusted U.S. yields are still higher than their German counterparts, the drop in nominal U.S. yields below 1.2% this week has raised concern over the global growth outlook. Ulrich Leuchtmann, head of FX at Commerzbank, said that if global production and consumption did not return to 2019 levels soon, then a permanently lower GDP path has to be assumed. This is reflected to some extent in bond markets. Investor sentiment has become more cautious, according to weekly polls by the American Association of Individual Investors. BlackRock, the world’s biggest investment manager, cut U.S. equities to neutral in its mid-year outlook. Stephen Jen, who runs hedge fund Eurizon SLJ Capital, noted that because China’s business cycle was ahead of that of the United States or Europe, weaker data there is filtering through to investor sentiment in the West. Popular reflation trades in the commodity markets have also gone into reverse. A ratio of gold/copper prices has fallen 10% after rising to more than 6-1/2 year highs in May.
Covid UK news live: Death toll rises by almost 100 in 24 hours as government confirms self-isolation ‘crucial’
The UK has recorded its highest number of Covid deaths in a single-day period since 24 March, Public Health England data shows. Some 96 people died within 28 days of testing positive for coronavirus as of 9am on Tuesday. It brings the nation’s death toll to 128,823, while there were also 46,558 new cases of Covid reported in the same 24 hours. It comes as the government said it remains “crucial” for people to self-isolate when they receive a “ping” from the NHS coronavirus app, overruling an earlier comment from business minister Paul Scully. He said on Tuesday morning that it was up to individuals to make an “informed decision” about whether or not to quarantine after getting an alert. Hours later, Downing Street scrambled to clarify its position, saying that self-isolation was an important means of preventing the spread of the virus. “It is crucial people isolate when they are told to do so, either by NHS Test and Trace or by the NHS Covid app,” a No 10 spokesperson said. The UK records almost 100 Covid deaths in 24 hours – highest since March Only a fifth of people are using Covid app properly, poll shows One million kids are out of school due to Covid – data UK vaccine passport plans condemned as ‘absolute shambles’ Businesses can disregard Covid app ‘pings’, minister suggests. Minister rules out vaccine passports for pubs. Emergency calls increased by a third compared to a normal day, with a sudden wave of more than 400 calls in a single hour during the early afternoon. The London Ambulance Service has been at the highest level of demand, previously known as a “black alert”, since 17 June. Seven out of 10 ambulance services across England are in a similar situation. Scheduled operations have been cancelled as an NHS Scotland Trust’s three acute hospitals experience unprecedented levels of pressure. NHS Lanarkshire said that increased Covid-19 cases, staff shortages due to annual leave or staff having to self-isolate as a result of contacts outside of work, were causing the pressure, along with trying to maintain and recover services – including planned operations. There are currently 81 Covid-19 cases across its three sites – University Hospital Hairmyres, Monklands and Wishaw – with seven people in intensive care, the board said. On Monday, 643 patients also attended the sites’ A&E departments. “The sustained pressure we are seeing across our three acute hospitals is showing no signs of easing,” NHS Lanarkshire director of acute services, Judith Park, said. “In fact, the pressures on our hospitals are as severe as at any time in the whole pandemic.” Ms Park blamed non-Covid issues such as sunstroke for the steady rise in numbers, especially in recent days after the heatwave much of the UK has experienced. “Unfortunately, we have had to cancel a small number of planned surgeries over the last three weeks,” she added. “This is not a decision we take lightly and I would like to apologise for any upset caused.” Dr Yvonne Doyle, medical director at Public Health England, has issued a plea to the British public to continue taking coronavirus seriously.
She said while she understood people wanted to “get back to doing” what they loved most, it was important to remember that the virus’ risk is far from over.
“The past 18 months have been tough on us all. Now restrictions have lifted many of us want to get back to doing what we enjoy most,” she said on Tuesday. “However, we must do so with caution and remain sensible. We are in a wave of infections that has seen an increase of over 40 per cent in the past week, there is still a risk of severe illness for many people.” Offering some precautionary advice, she added: “We can all reduce the risk by getting both doses of the vaccine, testing ourselves twice a week at home and spending more time outside or in well ventilated rooms. Let’s all remain vigilant.” Fans were permitted entry to Wembley Stadium for the last rounds of Euro 2020 without needing to prove their Covid status, The Independent has learned.
The news comes amid reports suggesting large numbers of fans have contracted the virus since attending the final. So large have the anecdotal numbers been that some have taken to calling the virus surge among supporters “the Wembley variant”.
Ministers previously said attendance of the Events Research Programme matches would require proof of a negative test or full vaccination, but ticket-holding fans have told us they were allowed into the stadium without being properly checked. T he first exemptions for fully-vaccinated critical workers to isolate over coronavirus contacts have been granted under Boris Johnson’s plans to ease the “pingdemic”, according to Downing Street. No 10 said on Tuesday that NHS staff and workers in other sectors are among those who were granted approval to avoid quarantine for crucial work reasons as Covid-19 infections soar. In the face of widespread criticism from businesses over staff shortages, the PM announced a plan for a “small number” of critical workers to be able to continue. But he faced calls to clarify who would be eligible, after a government statement said it would not be a “blanket exemption for any sector or role”. Mr Johnson’s official spokesman said: “The first exemptions, I understand, have already been given in some critical sectors, that work is going on given the urgency. That’s in both wider sectors and the NHS as well.” But he added: “It’s not a blanket exemption and my understanding is we’re not going to be producing a list covering individual sectors, these business-critical areas will be able to apply for exemptions to their host departments.” The need for vaccine passports could be extended to venues such as pubs, Downing Street has implied.
The statement from No 10 comes just hours after business minister Paul Scully said pubs would not require customers to show proof of vaccination.
The correction came from Boris Johnson’s official spokesperson. “The prime minister talked about the sort of areas we were considering, and nightclubs are where there is significant evidence we have at the moment,” he said. “But we’re going to use the coming weeks to look at the evidence, particularly both in the UK and globally before making a specific decision.”
Delta strain amounts to 83% of new virus cases – US CDC head
Top infectious disease specialists say the spread of the delta variant across unvaccinated pockets of the country is causing flare-ups and leading to an increase in hospitalizations as cases climb. Nationwide, cases are once again on the rise as the highly transmissible variant takes hold as the dominant strain in the U.S. The seven-day average of newly confirmed Covid cases has climbed to about 23,300 a day, almost double the average from a week ago, according to data compiled by Johns Hopkins University. Health officials and physicians have been hoping that high vaccination rates among the most vulnerable and oldest Americans would keep hospitalizations, which generally lag new cases by a few weeks, from also rising. But that hasn’t materialized so far, doctors said on a call hosted Tuesday by the Infectious Diseases Society of America. “Hospitalizations ICU admissions and deaths all lag behind (new cases), so we expect those to continue to get worse, substantially worse over the next two to three weeks” Dr. Andrew T. Pavia, chief of pediatric infectious diseases at the University of Utah School of Medicine, said on the call. After several weeks of declining infections, cases are again climbing in many parts of the country, Dr. Jay Butler, deputy director for infectious diseases at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said on the call. “Unfortunately that’s also been accompanied by some increases in the number hospitalized, as well as emergency department evaluations, for people who are ultimately confirmed to have Covid-19,” he said. As the delta variant spreads across the U.S. it’s hitting states with low vaccination rates particularly hard. First detected in India in October, the variant is quickly spreading to more than 100 countries across the world and established itself as the dominant strain in America in a few weeks. “When the Delta strain appeared, it rapidly became the dominant strain. … In the last full week of data, more than 80% of the sequenced viruses were delta, and so far this week it’s 92% of all variants” (in Utah), Pavia said. “If you think about what it means to have a virus take over that rapidly, it means that it is the most fit virus, that is spreading more efficiently, that it is spreading in pockets that are unvaccinated and it’s causing a lot of disease and a lot of stress.” Cases are rising in Missouri, Arkansas, Nevada, Utah and Florida at higher rates than in other states over the past couple of weeks. New infections and hospitalizations are highest in rural areas, where vaccination rates are low, Pavia said. “That’s what drives the susceptibility to having an outbreak.” In Utah, the infection rates are highest among young people ages 15 to 45 and hospitalizations are similarly higher in those younger age groups than they were earlier in the pandemic, he said. Roughly 80% of Americans over the age of 65, the most at-risk population, are fully vaccinated, helping to drive down hospital rates. Scientists haven’t yet figured out whether the delta variant makes people sicker or not than the original ancestral strain. NB: how fucking stupid,,, of course we need a yearly booster shot targeted at the latest variant……U.S. health officials and physicians are still split on whether or not there will be a need for booster shots in the fall or winter. “We’re not seeing evidence at this point in time that waning immunity is occurring among people who were vaccinated back last December or January and that they are at higher risk of breakthrough infections,” the CDC’s Butler said. State Department, CDC says to avoid travel to the UK as Covid cases rise Echoing statements made by World Health Organization officials Monday, Butler also said that breakthrough cases are often milder and that the vaccines are extremely effective in reducing hospitalization and death. “There’s even evidence that people who have breakthrough infections, who are fully immunized, are shedding less virus … it can reduce the risk of spread to others,” Butler said. The WHO also recently recommended both vaccinated and unvaccinated people continue wearing masks and practice social distancing, citing reduced vaccine efficacy against the delta variant and increased social mixing in countries with varying rates of immunization. “Everyone wants this to be over, and a lot of the behavior that I think is driving the spread of infections is people wanting it to be over, and acting as if it’s over and really abandoning even the more modest precautions like mask-wearing,” Pavia said.
UK reopens, it is going to be a difficult summer
Stocks sink as virus worries fuel flight to safety
Stocks slumped around the world as investors rushed into haven assets after the delta coronavirus variant cast a pall over the economic recovery, while tension between the U.S. and China escalated. In a reversal of the reopening trade that has powered this year’s equity rally, cyclical companies bore the brunt of Monday’s rout. Commodity, financial and industrial shares led losses in the S&P 500, which fell the most since May. Airlines and cruise operators tumbled amid concern over further travel restrictions. After recently plunging to pre-pandemic levels, the Cboe Volatility Index, or VIX, soared. European stocks had their biggest drop of 2021, following a selloff in Asia. With the risk-off sentiment spreading across global markets, Treasury 10-year yields spiraled to their lowest since February, while the dollar rose alongside the yen and the Swiss franc. Despite the classic safety trade, gold retreated. Oil sank after OPEC+ agreed to boost supply into 2022. Meantime, Bitcoin’s slide pushed the world’s largest digital currency closer to US$30,000. The resurgence of COVID-19 is unsettling global investors, who are considering whether new lockdown restrictions will sap the economic rebound and reverse an equity rally that had driven stocks to a record. For Matt Miskin, co-chief investment strategist at John Hancock Investment Management, the move to “higher-quality assets” such as Treasuries is justified. In a Bloomberg Television interview, he said that “we’re in a decelerating growth environment.” “Risk aversion is firmly in place as the Delta COVID variant spread is triggering a flight to safety,” wrote Edward Moya, senior market analyst at Oanda. “Equities were ripe for a pullback given Wall Street was in agreement that this is ‘as good as it gets’ for peak earnings, economic growth, monetary stimulus. It is hard to hold risky assets over the short-term now.” Geopolitical jitters also resurfaced on Monday after the U.S., the U.K. and their allies said the Chinese government has been the mastermind behind a series of malicious ransomware, data theft and cyber-espionage attacks against public and private entities — including the sprawling Microsoft Exchange hack earlier this year.
U.S. surgeon general defends CDC mask change, blames tech companies for COVID deaths
https://youtu.be/hV37a62gX5k
I have bad news and bad news: Israeli government says Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine provides ‘significantly less’ protection against the Indian ‘Delta’ variant than health officials had hoped
The Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is ‘weaker’ against the Indian ‘Delta’ variant than health officials had hoped, a new report from Israel claims On Friday, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett held a discussion about the coronavirus with his Cabinet at the Kirya in Tel Aviv. Israel once led the entire world in the vaccine race, vaccinating 61 percent of its population with the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine – but is now dealing with a surge in cases. On Thursday, the test positivity rate was 1.52 percent, which is the highest number since March. As of June 6, the vaccine provides only 64 percent protection against infection from the variant, according to the Israeli government. ‘At the moment, there is an idea that is spreading to the effect that the protective ability of the existing vaccines against the Delta mutation is weaker than what we had hoped,’ Bennett said. ‘We do not know exactly to what degree the vaccine helps, but it is significantly less. We are all hoping to see a slowdown but the facts at the moment are that there is no slowdown, not here and not in the world.’ The Delta variant has been labeled as a ‘double mutant’ by India’s Health Ministry because it carries two mutations: L452R and E484Q. L452R is the same mutation seen with the California homegrown variant and E484Q is similar to the mutation seen in the Brazilian and South African variants. Both of the mutations occur on key parts of the virus that allows it to enter and infect human cells. Bennett also addressed the crises in the UK and the US, both of which are using the Pfizer vaccine and are overrun with the Delta variant. On Thursday, the U.S. recorded 28,412 new cases with a seven-day rolling average of 26,079, a 135 percent increase from the 11,067 average recorded two weeks ago. Nearly every state and the District of Columbia have seen infections rise in the last week, according to a DailyMail.com analysis of Johns Hopkins data. What’s more, about 40 states have seen their infection rates increase by at least 50 percent with some of the biggest rises seen in hotspots such as Arkansas, Louisiana and Missouri. With cases doubling every two weeks, this means the U.S. could see 50,000 cases per day by the end of July and 100,000 per day at the end of the month. Meanwhile, Britain’s daily coronavirus cases hit 50,000 on Friday for the first time since the depths of the second wave in January. Figures from the Department of Health show that the number of positive tests, which sits at 51,870, has risen by 45 percent in a week. Hospitalizations and deaths are now both rising steadily following the ferocious surge in cases, which top experts blamed on the relaxation of restrictions and Euro 2020. ‘At the moment, the Delta mutation is leaping forward around the world, including in vaccinated countries such as Britain, Israel and the US,’ Bennett said. ‘In Britain, in recent days, we have seen a jump in the number of children who are being hospitalized on a daily basis. This is a development that we are aware of; we are dealing with it rationally and responsibly.’ ‘On the one hand, the vaccines are effective against the virus; therefore, we are seeing to the necessary continuity of vaccinations and inventories. ‘Whoever hoped that the vaccines alone would solve the problem, they are not. What is necessary is a strategy that brings as many vaccines as possible on the one hand and, on the other, also understands the limits of the vaccine.’
U.S. COVID-19 cases more than double in two weeks as delta variant spreads fast, and WHO warns ‘pandemic nowhere near finished’
WHO sees ‘strong likelihood’ of new and possibly more dangerous variants of concern ‘that may be even more challenging to control’ The number of new cases of COVID-19 in the U.S. has more than doubled in the last two weeks, as the delta variant continues to race across the nation, infecting both vaccinated and unvaccinated people, who account for more than 99% of recent fatalities. The average case tally on Wednesday was 26,513, according to a New York Times tracker, (link)up 111% from two weeks ago. Hospitalizations have climbed 22% and deaths are up 5% in the same time frame, albeit they remain at far lower levels than at the peak of the crisis in the spring of 2020. Overall, 47 states are showing new cases up 10% from a week ago, according to Johns Hopkins University data (link). Experts are increasingly describing two Americas, divided between the vaccinated and unvaccinated, with the latter group putting themselves and others at risk of infection as the vaccine program grinds to a halt. Delta variant drove COVID-19 casesare higher across the globe last week — including in the U.S (link). The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and Infection’s vaccine tracker (link) is showing that 160 million Americans are fully inoculated, equal to 48.2% of the overall population. That means they have had two shots of the vaccines developed by Pfizer (PFE) and German partner BioNTech (BNTX) and Moderna (MRNA), or one shot of Johnson & Johnson’s (JNJ) one-dose regimen. The AstraZeneca (AZN.LN) vaccine has not been granted emergency use authorization in the U.S. Among adults 18-years-and-older, 59.1% are fully vaccinated, while 67.8% have received at least one dose, still short of President Joe Biden’s goal of having 70% of the adult population receive at least one shot by the July 4 holiday. The numbers are barely budging day-to-day now, despite concerns expressed by healthcare experts. “We’re losing time here. The delta variant is spreading, people are dying, we can’t actually just wait for things to get more rational,” Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health told CNN Wednesday. The World Health Organization’s emergency committee warned that with delta and three other variants of concern still circulating, the “pandemic is nowhere near finished.” Instead, there is a “strong likelihood for the emergence and global spread of new and possibly more dangerous variants of concern that may be even more challenging to control,” the committee said in a statement emergency-committee-regarding-the-coronavirus-disease-(covid-19)-pandemic). Elsewhere, Indonesia set another daily case record of 54,517 and has overtaken India as the Asian epicenter of the pandemic, CNN reported. At least 991 fatalities were recorded in the nation of about 170 million people on Wednesday to push the total to 69,210. Russia had 25,293 new cases and a record death toll of 791 on Thursday, according to The Moscow Times, raising the overall death toll to 146,069, the highest official number in Europe. In China, local governments are moving aggressively to push residents to get vaccinated and some are planning to bar them from accessing public venues if they refuse, The Wall Street Journal reported. Roughly a dozen counties and cities in the eastern provinces of Zhejiang, Fujian and Jiangxi have set late-August deadlines for people 18 years or older to complete a two-shot vaccine regimen, according to similarly worded online statements. Many of them also set dates in late July by when unvaccinated people would be barred from entering schools, libraries, prisons, nursing homes and inpatient facilities at hospitals without a valid medical exemption, the paper reported. China has fully vaccinated more than 40% of its population of 1.4 billion so far. A cluster of COVID cases at a hotel hosting Olympic athletes is raising concerns coming just over a week before the opening ceremony, Reuters reported. Adding to the gloom, Tokyo has just recorded its highest number of new COVID cases in six months. Singapore reported its highest case number in 10 months, after uncovering a cluster among hostesses and customers at Karaoke bars, Reuters reported. Singapore has yet to reopen KTV lounges and clubs and authorities said the places where the virus spread were operating as food and beverage outlets. Meanwhile, the United Nations’ Unicef agency and the World Health Organization said about 23 million children missed out on other basic vaccinations during the pandemic and warned of the potential for outbreaks of diseases including polio, measles and meningitis. “Multiple disease outbreaks would be catastrophic for communities and health systems already battling COVID-19, making it more urgent than ever to invest in childhood vaccination and ensure every child is reached,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a statement. “This is a wake-up call — we cannot allow a legacy of COVID-19 to be the resurgence of measles, polio and other killers,” said Dr. Seth Berkley, CEO of Gavi, the Vaccine Alliance. “We all need to work together to help countries both defeat COVID-19, by ensuring global, equitable access to vaccines, and get routine immunization programs back on track.” Pfizer is making the case for COVID-19 boosters. Health officials say we don’t need a third dose yet. The global tally for the coronavirus-borne illness climbed above 188.5 million on Thursday, while the death toll climbed further above 4.06 million, according to data aggregated by Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. leads the world with a total of 33.9 million cases and in deaths with 608,135. India is closing in on the U.S. in cases at 30.9 million but is third in deaths at 411,989, while Brazil is second in deaths at 537,394 but is third in cases at 19.2 million. Mexico has the fourth-highest death toll at 235,507 but has recorded just 2.6 million cases, according to its official numbers. In Europe, the U.K. has 128,797 deaths the second highest in Europe after Russia. China, where the virus was first discovered late in 2019, has had 104,157 confirmed cases and 4,848 deaths, according to its official numbers, which are widely held to be massively under-reported.
Delta variant risks WILL spark market correction
The highly contagious Delta variant of Covid-19 has fast become the dominant strain around the world, spreading beyond Asia. Countries with low vaccination rates like Australia have had no choice but to reimpose draconian lockdowns, but in other places such as America and Britain despite the fact most adults have had at least one vaccine dose, are seeing infection rates skyrocketing and may have to impose lockdowns
The Delta variant that was first detected in India is spreading rampantly everywhere and is threatening to undo more than a year of progress in getting the virus contained. Countries including France, Australia, Malaysia, Indonesia and Bangladesh have all announced fresh lockdowns in the last couple of weeks and there are fears more cities and regions will fall victim to stay-at-home orders if the Delta strain continues to rage.
Surprising amounts of death will arrive in these us regions
https://youtu.be/-oBOk6-num4
(CNN)When you compare states with high vaccination rates to states that are lagging, the difference in the number of people getting Covid-19 is staggering. Over the past week, states that have fully vaccinated more than half of their residents have reported an average Covid-19 case rate that is about a third of that in states which have fully vaccinated less than half of their residents, according to a CNN analysis of data from Johns Hopkins University and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Alabama, Mississippi and Arkansas are the only states to have fully vaccinated fewer than 35% of their residents. Average daily case rates in each state were among the 10 worst in the country last week. Vermont leads the nation with about 66% of its population fully vaccinated — and while case rates there increased compared to last week, the state still had the lowest case rate in the country last week, with an average of less than one new case per 100,000 people each day.
Covid-19 cases rise in US hotspots States that have fully vaccinated more than half of their residents reported an average of 2.8 new Covid-19 cases per 100,000 people each day last week, compared to an average of about 7.8 cases per 100,000 people each day in states that have vaccinated less than half of their residents. “We really need to get more people vaccinated, because that’s the solution,” Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said Monday on “CBS This Morning.” “This virus will, in fact, be protected against by the vaccine.” Across the country, more than 99% of US Covid-19 deaths in June were among unvaccinated people, said Dr. Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Dr. Howard Jarvis, an emergency medicine physician in Springfield, Missouri, told CNN on Monday that his sick patients are all unvaccinated. “If they’re sick enough to be admitted to the hospital, they are unvaccinated. That is the absolute common denominator amongst those patients,” he said. “I can see the regret on their face. You know, we ask them, because we want to know, are you vaccinated? And it’s very clear that a lot of them regret (not being vaccinated).” The pace of vaccinations has dropped sharply in recent months. About 246,000 people initiated vaccination each day over the past week, down 88% from the April peak, and about 278,000 people became fully vaccinated each day over the past week, down 84% from the April peak, CDC data shows. About 56.2% of Americans 12 or older are fully vaccinated.