The U.S. economy is ready to take off, U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Sunday. In an interview with CBS News’ “60 Minutes,” which released a snippet Sunday morning, Powell said increased growth should create more jobs. The full interview will air Sunday night at 7 p.m. Eastern on CBS. “What we’re seeing now is really an economy that seems to be at an inflection point,” Powell said in the interview. “We feel like we’re at a place where the economy’s about to start growing much more quickly and job creation coming in much more quickly.” Powell credited widespread vaccinations and strong fiscal-policy support through the pandemic, but warned that the economy could suffer a setback if there’s another wave of COVID-19 infections. “It’s going to be smart if people can continue to socially distance and wear masks,” he said.
It’s NOT the National Debt….. Stupid!
(Bloomberg) — Economics used to offer lots of metrics that claimed to show when growing economies were approaching some kind of speed limit. But increasingly, inflation is the only one that’s taken seriously.A lasting surge in prices would likely convince policy makers that it’s time to tap the brakes on expansionary measures adopted in the pandemic, like high public spending or low borrowing costs. That’s why Tuesday’s consumer-price data in the U.S. will be so closely watched — though it’ll take more than a single month’s numbers to change minds.
Meanwhile — as part of a profound shift in economic thinking that’s gathered pace in the past year — a whole range of other indicators once relied on to flag trouble ahead are falling out of favor.
Budget deficits and public debt were thought to flash a warning sign at certain levels — until plenty of countries exceeded those limits, especially in the last year, without crashing. Estimates for full employment, or the most jobs an economy could create without overheating, turned out to be wrong. Measures of the so-called “output gap” are supposed to capture how close an economy has gotten to its maximum capacity — but many analysts have concluded that they rely too much on the recent past to be a useful guide. Abandoning or downplaying all of these yardsticks means officials are less likely to take the kind of pre-emptive action that’s choked off expansions in the past.The shift also amounts to a pivot toward humility, in a profession not famous for it. Economists used to be comfortable with offering their predictions as a basis for policy. They’re having to acknowledge that the future is full of things they simply do not know.“The influence of long-term projections has evaporated, and that’s a very good thing,” says James Galbraith, a professor of economics at the University of Texas. “You design policies to deal with the problems you have. If they have consequences later, you address them later.” That philosophy underpins the Federal Reserve’s new interest-rate framework. Last decade, the central bank began raising borrowing costs even though inflation was subdued and unemployment was still around 5% post-financial crisis. Now, Fed officials effectively concede that was a mistake, because lower unemployment didn’t trigger a spike in prices. And now they say they’ll base policy on what’s actually happened in the economy, rather than what’s expected to come next. Three times in a speech last month, Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard contrasted “outcomes” with the “outlook” -– and said Fed policy will be based on the former, not the latter. In fiscal policy too, there’s been a rethink of speed limits.Budget deficits and national debt as a share of the economy used to be the go-to metrics. The European Union imposed 3% deficit caps. Economists Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff, in an influential study a decade ago, argued that debt at 90% of GDP was a dangerous tipping point. This kind of thinking led to austerity policies after the initial shock of the 2008 financial crisis — and the result was a weak recovery. But budget forecasts tended to be too pessimistic because they didn’t anticipate that interest rates would remain low. In the pandemic, governments have been more willing to spend, especially in the U.S. President Joe Biden is pushing measures worth more than $5 trillion during his first year –- fuel for what already looks set to be a faster rebound in the economy. In some ways, the new approach aligns with the school of thought called Modern Monetary Theory. MMT says governments have room to rev up their economies with fiscal spending, and argues that inflation — rather than deficit or debt levels — is the metric that budget authorities need to keep their eye on.“One thing the mainstream has caught on to is allowing the economy to run a bit hotter,” says Scott Fullwiler, an MMT economist and associate professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City. “That’s the thing we’ve been hitting on for decades.”Unfortunately, says Fullwiler, economists haven’t devoted enough attention to the question of what a safe maximum speed would be — and have focused too much on central banks, even though it’s now fiscal policy that is driving recoveries.“The economics profession in general has far and away enough capacity to figure out how hot the economy can run,” he says. It would have better answers right now “if economists had been working on fiscal-policy frameworks for stabilizing the economy and keeping inflation low, instead of optimal monetary policy, which is basically irrelevant.” In the U.S., opponents of Biden’s spending have invoked the “output gap” — the difference between the goods and services an economy is actually producing, and the maximum it could sustainably manage. Former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, for example, both argued that last month’s stimulus bill was much bigger than what was needed to close that shortfall — and risked triggering inflation as a result.But many analysts are skeptical about the measure. Robin Brooks, chief economist at the Institute of International Finance, has been leading a campaign against “nonsense output gaps” for years.The output gap is “a massively important concept” that underlies all the big policy calls, he says. “Nobody has any clue about how to measure it.” Output gaps rely on estimates of an economy’s potential. A small shortfall means production is reckoned to be getting close to its speed limits, and trying to make it go faster could set off inflation. But Brooks says that potential is often calculated simply by looking at what happened in the recent past. He says that when a country has been under-performing for an extended period, like Italy in recent decades, the result is that its potential gets downgraded too — effectively putting a cap on how good things should be allowed to get. In a February report, Goldman Sachs economists tried an alternative way of measuring, and concluded that output gaps in major economies from Italy to the U.S. were likely bigger at the end of last year than official estimates suggested — meaning that there was “more slack,” less risk of inflation and a stronger case for expansionary policy. Since then, the U.S. recovery has gained pace, surprising many analysts. Galbraith, who was director of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress during the recession of the early 1980s, says emergencies aren’t the right time for policy makers to attempt any kind of precision forecasts.“You don’t try to calculate these things,” he says. “You throw at it as much as you need, and more. And then, if it turns out that you’re doing too much — which is improbable — you scale it back.”
Real-world Israeli study shows SA variant can break through Pfizer vaccine
Researchers say highlights need to properly monitor for mutations entering Israel through the airport
The Pfizer coronavirus vaccine is somewhat less effective against the South African mutation; a new study has shown, raising a red flag among health professionals of the need to continue monitoring Israel’s airports to keep out what could be dangerous mutations. The study, conducted by Clalit Health Services and Tel Aviv University, was the first of its kind based on real-world data. It has been published on the MedRxiv online site and therefore has not yet been peer-reviewed. “The results indicate the need for genetic sequencing and constant monitoring for new variants, as well as continued implementation of non-pharmaceutical measures,” said Clalit’s Dr. Doron Netzer, head of Community Medicine at Clalit, who helped lead the study. Lab studies have previously suggested that the South African variant could break through the protection provided by the Pfizer vaccine, but lab studies do not always hold up in real life.
The study counters a report released by Pfizer earlier this month that claimed the vaccine was 100% effective in preventing coronavirus among participants trialed in South Africa, where the mutation is prevalent.
In this case, what was shown in the lab turned out to also occur in real life, Prof. Adi Stern, of the Shmunis School of Biomedicine and Cancer Research at Tel Aviv University’s Faculty of Life Sciences, told The Jerusalem Post. The study seems to counter a report released by Pfizer earlier this month that claimed the vaccine was 100% effective in preventing coronavirus among participants from a trial in South Africa, where the mutation is prevalent. The report was released on Saturday night. This week, the Health Ministry plans to discuss allowing Israelis to go mask-free in open areas immediately after the Independence Day holiday that takes place on Thursday. Last week, the government voted to change airport regulations and allow non-Israelis to visit their first-degree relatives in the country. Since March 20, all Israeli citizens have been able to enter from abroad. Specifically, the researchers examined around 400 members of Clalit Health who tested positive for the virus 14 days or more after receiving the first dose of the vaccine in comparison to 400 unvaccinated people who caught corona, too. The cohorts were matched according to age, sector, gender and more.
The study showed that the South African variant is more likely to break through the vaccine’s protective effect, even after two doses have been administered and more than a week has passed.
All positive samples underwent genetic sequencing to determine with which variant each person was infected. Only 1% of the infected people had the South African variant. However, among individuals who had been infected after receiving two doses of the vaccine, the prevalence rate of those who had the South African variant was eight times higher than the rate in the unvaccinated matched individuals. This means that the Pfizer vaccine does not provide the same level of protection against the South African variant. However, because so few Israelis have been infected with it, the researchers said they were unable to assess the exact reduction in effectiveness. Stern suggested that the South African has less transmissibility than the original strain and certainly less than the British mutation – that has been shown to be as much as 70% more contagious than the original strain – and therefore has not managed to spread. “It can break through the vaccine, but it cannot spread efficiently, so that is the good news,” Stern said, noting that one possible explanation is that the extensive spread of the British variant blocked the spread of the South African variant.
The results of the study drive home the message that Israel “has to be super careful about airports,” Stern cautioned. “We are in a unique position in Israel now. The vaccines are working, and amazingly, we are the only country in the world where life is going back to normal. The main threat now is what will happen through airport importations.”
Stern said that anyone who enters Israel should be tested and, if they are sick, the country should sequence their results to find out what variant they bear. They should also be effectively isolated. “We don’t want to import masses of the South African variant and we don’t want to test how limited the transmissibility [of the variant] is in Israel,” Stern cautioned. The study also examined the effectiveness of the Pfizer vaccine against the British variant and, once again, showed that the vaccine works. However, in 250 partially vaccinated individuals – meaning they had only had one dose of the vaccine or less than a week had passed since the second dose – the rate of the British variant was disproportionately higher compared to unvaccinated persons. This means, Stern explained, that although some studies have shown a strong efficacy of the Pfizer vaccine even after the first dose, it takes two doses to combat the British variant most effectively. She said that this may explain why in December and January when so many Israelis started vaccinating it took longer than expected to bring down the country’s rate of infection.
“The findings signal that we cannot yet regard the pandemic as a thing of the past,” said Prof. Shay Ben-Shachar, head of Precision Medicine for Clalit Innovation. “It still remains important to continue social distancing and using masks.”
Powell: Upward pressure on prices likely only temporary
(Reuters) -The U.S. Federal Reserve plans to keep its super-easy policy in place even as data shows the economy kicking into higher gear, with policymakers predicting on Thursday that an expected increase in prices this year will fade on its own, and warning about the recent uptick in COVID-19 infections. “Cases are moving back up here, so I would just urge that people do get vaccinated and continue socially distancing,” Fed Chair Jerome Powell, who has had his shots, said at an economic forum during virtual International Monetary Fund and World Bank meetings. “We don’t want to get another outbreak; even if it might have less economic damage and kill fewer people, it’ll slow down the recovery.”
Speaking at a separate event, St. Louis Federal Reserve Bank President James Bullard said the Fed should not even discuss changes in monetary policy until it is clear the pandemic is over, tying future Fed discussions tightly to the success of the vaccination effort.
The Fed has said it will keep buying $120 billion in bonds a month until it sees “substantial further progress” toward meeting the central bank’s employment and inflation goals. Bullard said he regards that as contingent on beating the coronavirus. “We have to get the pandemic behind us first,” he said. “There are still risks, and things could go in a different direction.” The Fed has long said the virus, which touched off the sharpest downturn in decades just over a year ago, will determine the course of the recovery. Some 3 million Americans are getting vaccinated every day, and a majority of older Americans at highest risk of dying from COVID-10 have been fully vaccinated. That, along with last month’s $1.9 trillion pandemic relief package and the Fed’s near-zero interest rates, sets the economy up for what Fed officials expect to be the fastest growth in 40 years this year. But new variants of the virus are driving surges in caseloads in swaths of the Midwest and Northeast particularly. Minneapolis Fed President Neel Kashkari told the Economic Club of New York in yet another virtual event on Thursday that those variants, and the school and daycare center closures they could force, are the “biggest risks” to the U.S. recovery. Meanwhile, much of the world has barely begun mass vaccinations, posing what policymakers said was another risk. Fed policymakers do expect a surge in spending in coming months, along with bottlenecks in supply, to push prices higher this year. They say that’s unlikely to turn into the kind of upward spiral in prices that would constitute worrisome inflation and require the Fed to respond with rate hikes. “We think there will be upward pressure on prices which may be passed along to consumers in the form of price increases – we think that that will be temporary,” Powell said, noting that inflation has been low for 25 years, feeding into a psychology of low inflation expectations. And despite a government report last week showing U.S. employers added nearly a million jobs last month, there are still nearly 9 million fewer employed people in the American economy than there were before the pandemic. Powell said he would want to see “a string of months like that so we can really begin to show progress toward our goals.” The unevenness of the recovery, too, is a serious issue, Powell said, with minorities, women and workers in sectors like leisure and hospitality faring worse than others. Fed policymakers boosted their forecasts for growth, inflation and employment this year, but Powell noted that would not necessarily feed into any policy change. To judge whether it was time to reduce asset purchases, Powell said, “we are not really looking at forecasts for this purpose, we are looking at actual progress” on inflation and employment.
Ketchup shortage in restaurants across United States
Nick Bit: When ever i see or hear about ketchup i always remember the “The Ketchup Song” filmed and recorded by the Spanish pop group Las Ketchup. The music video was shot at Palm Beach, Estepona in Spain, at Chiringuito bar. The song and the video were a joke. Everyone was amazed when it went viral. At the time i was using the same studio to put up videos for our financial news broadcasts. At that time we were travailing on the south coast of Spain and i had to use outside studios. THe Yacht was on dry dock so i needed a studio for about a week. I had finished making a weekend video and as we were leaving the broadcast center we got invited for a seafood brunch and to be extras for the shoot. If you look carefully you can see a glimpse of me for a few frames (I have on a yellow Hawaii style shirt) And several shots of the kids in the video. It was released in July 2002 (remember we were making a stock market killing back then) as the ketchup song became a lead single from the bands debut album, Hijas del Tomate. The song was a joke. They were going to have a studio session and decided to have a party at the Palm Beach bar and shoot a practice session. No one ever dreamed the video would became a major flamenco Europop fusion hit with “Aserejé” (released as The Ketchup Song” in the UK and other countries) In the summer of 2001.
And now i must report to you the present Ketchup stock market indicator. Heinz confirmed to USA TODAY on Tuesday that the company will expand its efforts to address an unlikely byproduct of the COVID-19 pandemic that has impacted restaurants and fast food chains across the United States: a ketchup packet shortage. Manufacturing lines will be increased by about 25 percent to produce more than 12 billion packets a year. In wake of the pandemic, the CDC issued guidelines urging Americans to “avoid using or sharing items that are reusable, such as menus, condiments, and any other food containers,” and instead, use “single serving condiments,” such as ketchup packets. The Wall Street Journal reports the price of packets have risen 13 percent since January 2020. Even though Heinz “made strategic manufacturing investments at the start of the pandemic to keep up with the surge in demand for ketchup packets driven by the accelerated delivery and take-out trends,” the company still wasn’t able to meet the country’s overwhelmingly high demands, as tabletop bottles were no longer being used. In November, Heinz attempted to “further meet changing restaurant needs” with the creation of the no-touch dispenser. Ketchup is only the beginning. Bloomberg reports the price of pepperoni has nearly doubled in some cases due to an increased demand for pizza and fewer workers at pork processing plants since they must abide by social distancing requirements. The widely-covered, and often joked about blockage of the Suez Canal could also lead to a number of shortages since about 10 percent of global trade passes through the canal. The most notable items that could soon begin to feel the crunch are toilet paper, and coffee.
Jamie Dimon says economic boom fueled by deficit spending, vaccines could ‘easily run into 2023’
Jamie Dimon is bullish on the U.S. economy – at least for the next few years. Dimon, the long-serving JPMorgan Chase CEO and chairman, sees strong growth ahead for the world’s biggest economy, thanks to the U.S. government’s response to the coronavirus pandemic that has left many consumers flush with savings, according to his annual shareholder letter. “I have little doubt that with excess savings, new stimulus savings, huge deficit spending, more QE, a new potential infrastructure bill, a successful vaccine and euphoria around the end of the pandemic, the U.S. economy will likely boom,” Dimon said in the letter. “This boom could easily run into 2023 because all the spending could extend well into 2023.” Dimon, who managed JPMorgan through the 2008 financial crisis, helping create the biggest U.S. bank by assets, pointed out that the magnitude of government spending during the pandemic far exceeds the response to that previous crisis. The longer-term impact of the reopening boom won’t be known until years into the future, he said, because it will take time to ascertain the quality of government spending, including President Joe Biden’s proposed $2 trillion infrastructure bill. “Spent wisely, it will create more economic opportunity for everyone,” he said. Dimon, 65, weighed in on a range of topics familiar to watchers of the country’s most prominent banker: He promoted JPMorgan’s efforts to create economic opportunities for Americans who have been left behind, highlighted threats to U.S. banks’ dominance from fintech and Big Tech players, and opined on public policy and the role of corporations to help bring about change. While Dimon called stock market valuations “quite high,” he said that a multi-year boom may justify current levels, because markets are pricing in economic growth and excess savings that make their way into equities. He said there was “some froth and speculation” in parts of the market, but didn’t say where exactly. “Conversely, in this boom scenario it’s hard to justify the price of U.S. debt (most people consider the 10-year bond as the key reference point for U.S. debt),” Dimon said. “This is because of two factors: first, the huge supply of debt that needs to be absorbed; and second, the not-unreasonable possibility that an increase in inflation will not be just temporary.” While he is bullish for the economy’s immediate future, there are serious challenges ahead for the U.S., Dimon said. The country has been tested before – though conflicts starting with the Civil War, the Great Depression and the societal upheaval of the 1960s and 1970s, he said. “In each case, America’s might and resiliency strengthened our position in the world, particularly in relation to our major international competitors,” Dimon said. “This time may be different.” The past year highlighted challenges for U.S. institutions, elected officials and families, as our country’s rivals see a “nation torn and crippled by politics, as well as racial and income inequality – and a country unable to coordinate government policies (fiscal, monetary, industrial, regulatory) in any coherent way to accomplish national goals.” The country ultimately needs to “move beyond our differences and self-interest and act for the greater good,” Dimon said. “The good news is that this is fixable.”
All adults in US will be eligible for vaccination by April 19 – Biden
President Biden announced Tuesday that he is moving up the deadline for states to open up COVID-19 vaccinations to all U.S. residents 18 and older by about two weeks. Less than a month after directing states to expand eligibility to all adults by May 1, Biden changed that deadline to April 19.
“No more confusing rules, no more confusing restrictions,” Biden said.
The president made his announcement after visiting a vaccination site at Virginia Theological Seminary in Alexandria, an Episcopal institution founded in 1823. His visit was intended to highlight the participation of religious organizations in the vaccination effort. Most states have either made vaccines available to all residents 16 and older or announced plans to do so by mid-April. The White House did not say how it intends to get the handful of remaining states to move up their timelines. Officials announced at the end of March that nearly half of states were set to expand eligibility to all adults by April 15, and that 46 states and Washington, D.C., would do so by May 1. In the weeks since, the remaining four states — New York, Wyoming, South Carolina and Arkansas — have all opened vaccines to the general public.
Biden also announced that the U.S. administered 150 million doses in his first 75 days in office, a pace that puts the administration on track to surpassing his previously stated goal of reaching 200 million doses in his first 100 days.
The country is averaging 3.1 million shots per day over a seven-day period, White House officials said Monday, and reached a new milestone over the weekend with an unprecedented 4 million vaccinations recorded in one day. Nearly 1 in 4 adults are fully vaccinated, officials added. According to NPR’s vaccine tracker, 18.8% of the U.S. population is fully vaccinated, and 32.4% has had at least one dose. The states with the highest percentage of their populations vaccinated include New Mexico, South Dakota, Alaska, Rhode Island and Maine.
US Job openings up to 7.4 million in February — more proof of ultra-strong labor market
The number of U.S. job openings rebounded to a near-record 7.49 million in March, showing that companies are still ready and willing to hire even though the economy is not growing as rapidly as it was a year earlier. Job openings had fallen to nine-month low of 7.14 million in February, when hiring was crimped by poor weather and the lingering effects of a partial government shutdown. Openings hit an all-time high of 7.63 million last November. Transportation and warehousing companies — the firms that deliver internet packages — increased help-wanted ads by 87,000. Job listings for construction rose 73,000. And real estate-related job openings climbed by 57,000. The share of people who left jobs on their own, known as the quits rate, was flat at 2.5% among private-sector employees. The rate was unchanged at 2.3% for all workers including those in government. More workers tend to quit when they feel secure enough to leave one job for another — a sign of a healthy economy. The quits rate has risen steadily in the past decade from a post-recession low of 1.4%, though it appears to have peaked. A strong labor market is acting as guardrails for the U.S. economy, keeping it on track to break the record for longest expansion ever in a few months. The rate of unemployment fell last month to a nearly 50-year low of 3.6% and layoffs are also at a half-century low. Job openings have now exceeded the number of unemployed Americans for 13 straight months,” noted Julia Pollak, a labor economist at employment marketplace ZipRecruiter. “This report is a calming return to the trend we’ve seen for years now: high labor demand translating into a slow but steady increase in worker confidence,’said Nick Bunker, an economist at Indeed Hiring Lab. “This uptick is a positive sign, though year-over-year growth in job postings is still on the decline.”
GM deliveries in China surge 69% in Q1, US car sales soaring too
GM and its joint ventures delivered more than 780,000 vehicles in China in the first three months, a 69% increase in comparison to the same period last year when it was negatively impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. The company’s rebound was driven by performance in luxury and premium vehicles, as well as midsize and large MPVs and SUVs.The carmaker added it is also introducing cutting-edge EV technology in China with the industry’s first hyper-scale battery platform Ultium. The first product that will use Ultium in China, the Cadillac LYRIC SUV, is slated to debut at Auto Shanghai 2021 in late April. US car sales are also booming. Automaker sales figures are streaming in, both for the month of March and for the first quarter of 2021. The news is generally good, and in some cases, really good with near-universal increases in the double digits and some brands even reporting triple-digit jumps. March 2021 was something of a perfect storm for record-setting sales, as a year ago saw COVID-19-related shutdowns crippling the auto industry hard. COVID is obviously still an issue, but with markets generally open and shoppers flush with stimulus payments, March 2021 was an extremely active period for new car purchases.
Dow Futures Leap After Blowout Jobs Report; Tesla Gains on Deliveries
The strongest job gains since last August, as well as a coronavirus vaccine rollout that is reaching 4 million Americans a day, has U.S. stock futures on the move Monday.
https://youtu.be/P8UEkAzF8z0
- Global stocks build on April gains following last week’s blowout jobs report that could mark a turning point in the U.S. pandemic recovery.
- Employers added 916,000 new jobs in March, a much higher-than-expected total that tips the headline unemployment rate to 6%.
- Benchmark 10-year note yields rise to 1.718% following last week’s jobs report, with Fed Funds now pricing in a 15% chance of a December rate hike.
- Oil prices slide as OPEC leaders agree to a gradual increase in production levels by the end of May, with Saudi Arabia phasing out its voluntary cuts by the end of July.
- CDC data shows 61.5 million Americans have now been fully vaccinated against the coronavirus, with more than 165 million doses administered as of Sunday.
- U.S. equity futures suggest a firmer open on Wall Street heading into a muted week of economic and corporate releases, with focus soon shifting to second quarter earnings from the banking sector on April 14.
U.S. equity futures moved higher Monday, while bond traders began pricing in a Federal Reserve rate hike by the end of the year, following a blowout March jobs report last week that looks to mark a turning point in the economy’s pandemic recovery. Employers added a much more-than-expected 916,000 jobs last month, the Labor Department said in a rare Good Friday release, tipping the headline unemployment rate to 6%. An upward revision of the February tally, which was finalized at 468,000, added to evidence that state re-openings – aided by an accelerating vaccine rollout – will likely boost hiring in the months ahead. However, with the economy rolling into a full-fledge spring hiring boom, and consumers fueled by the recent $1.9 trillion American Rescue Act, fixed income markets are growing increasingly concern over the near-term chances of faster inflation, even as average hourly earnings slowed in last month’s jobs report. Benchmark 2-year Treasury note yields jumped to 0.19% in overnight trading, the highest in 18 months, while the CME Group’s FedWatch tool suggested a 16% chance of a Federal Reserve rate hike before the end of the year, up from around 4% at the beginning of last month. That hasn’t dented U.S. equity futures as yet, with contracts tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average indicating a 205-point opening bell gain and those linked to the S&P 500, which closed above the 4,000-point mark for the first time last week, priced for a 20-point advance. Rate moves did, however, hold back Nasdaq Composite futures, which are priced for a modest 55-point bump as benchmark 10-year note yields edged higher, to 1.718%, in holiday-thinned overnight trading. Tesla shares look set to pace premarket gainers after posting forecast-beating first quarter delivery numbers Friday thanks to China demand for its Model 3 sedan, with traders pricing in a 7.7% advance to $712.88 per share. Oil prices were on the back foot, with WTI crude sliding back towards the $60 mark, after OPEC leaders, as well as non-member allies such as Russia, agreed to gradually increase their collective output by the end of May, a move that will add around 350,000 barrels of oil to the market each day. Saudi Arabia also agreed to phase it out own voluntary cuts, which are taking 1 million barrels from the market each day, by the end of July. WTI futures contracts for May delivery fell $1.30 overnight to $60.19 per barrel while Brent futures contracts for June, the global benchmark, were last seen $1.41 lower at $63.45 per barrel. Easter Monday holiday kept most markets in Europe closed for the session, with many in Asia also shut for the traditional Christian observance. Japan’s Nikkei 225 ended the session 0.79% higher at 30,089.25 points as the yen weakened to a near one-year low of 110.61 against the greenback, while the region-wide MSCI ex-Japan benchmark was little changed from Friday’s close heading into the final hours of trading.