The US trade deficit inflated to an all time high in February. The goods and services deficit increased 4.8% on a month-to-month basis to $ 71.1 billion in February, according to the US Census Bureau. Exports fell 2.6 percent or $ 5 billion to $ 187.3 billion, while imports fell a more modest 0.7 percent or $ 1.7 billion to 258.3 billions of dollars.
Federal Reserve officials said the danger of suddenly high inflation was about equal to that of unusually slow inflation. “Most participants indicated that they viewed the risks to the inflation outlook as being broadly balancedAccording to the minutes of the Federal Free Market Commission meeting in March, released Wednesday.
US health care groups are investigating potential treatment for people with “Covid brain fog“. Akili Interactive has partnered with Weill Cornell Medicine, NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital and Vanderbilt University Medical Center to test Akili’s digital therapeutic AKL-T01 as a treatment for cognitive dysfunction in people with Covid-19.
Turkey will lower interest rates and inflation to single digits, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said a week before the central bank holds its first rate-setting meeting with a new governor whose surprise appointment in March baffled investors. Erdogan has long insulted high interest rates, which he says causes inflation.
Top incomes and businesses that thrived during the pandemic should pay additional taxes to show solidarity with those hardest hit, according to the IMF. A temporary tax would help reduce social inequalities Exacerbated by the economic and health crisis of the past year, the fund said Wednesday in its semi-annual budget report.
Royal Dutch Shell said higher oil prices enabled its exploration and production activities to perform well in the first quarter, although gas trading results are expected to be “well below average”. The Anglo-Dutch major said adjusted profit in the upstream company in the first three months of this year would be “positive”.
Willie Walsh, former head of British Airways, returned to the airline industry with a stark warning to Heathrow and other airports not to use the pandemic for raise prices. The Irish executive, in his new post as head of the International Air Transport Association, has accused other parts of the industry of monopoly prices.
Carnival, the world’s largest cruise line, said bookings for the 2022 vacation were ahead of 2019 levels, indicating there are repressed request for cruises despite its hectic year. Carnival said bookings in the first quarter of 2021 were up 90% from the last quarter of 2020.
A huge increase in US government spending will stimulate the economy at least over the next two years, said Jamie Dimon, managing director of JPMorgan Chase. He told shareholders that high savings rates, stimulus packages, a potential infrastructure package and “the euphoria around the end of the pandemic” were likely to revive the US economy.
