Investors cranking out the umbrellas like [praetorianphoto/E+ via GettyImages]
"In the red"... Not a phrase we've heard recently re: the stock market. The market closed lower last week, after rallying to records for three weeks in a row. Yesterday, things got worse for the major stock indexes.
Cloudy with a chance of N-95 masks... A surge in Covid cases driven by the highly-contagious Delta variant is pouring cold water on recovery optimism. Ballooning Covid cases — mostly among the unvaccinated — in highly-vaxed countries like the US and the UK have dampened investors' expectations of economic growth. The CDC is calling the US surge "a pandemic of the unvaccinated." A few big counties, including LA, brought back indoor mask mandates last week. Meanwhile in developing countries, the situation is more dire.
The market mood has shifted... again. Stock market prices aren't just a product of fundamentals like profits, but also of human psychology. Stocks have been basking in Caribbean-level sunshine, but investors are starting to fear clouds ahead. The VIX, which measures the stock market's expectation of volatility, has soared 36% in the past five days. As Delta rises, confidence is waning: US consumer sentiment plunged in early July to its lowest level in five months. Sharp price increases in everyday items could also be knocking confidence in spending. It's TBD how long this shift will last.