December 8—Employees and job-seekers are very much in the driver’s seat in today’s high-demand low-supply labor market—a severe issue punctuated by the November jobs report. And the labor participation rate remains a critical factor in trying to dimension the long-term trajectory of markets and inflation.
December 1, 2021 – Fears around the newest COVID-19 variant, Omicron, have jolted investors out of a holiday lull, sending risk assets lower, bond prices higher, and whipsawing expectations for future Fed policy. We see the Omicron variant as widening the range of possible economic and market outcomes over the next three to six months.
November 22, 2021—Following the conclusion of the most recent Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee plenum on November 11, it now seems almost certain that Xi Jinping, currently 68 years old, will remain ruler for the rest of his life. Moreover, it seems that Xi will persist in pursuing his political and socio-economic policies, including the “common prosperity” business interventions he ordered in 2021.
