meiroy

Social distancing can only really work if it's extremely strict or if everyone is forced to wear masks by law and it is enforced. It's enough to have one super spreader to start the whole thing again. Current half-assed measures are at best just to buy hospitals some time to load up on equipment and make sure they are not swamped. Not only is it not going to reopen by Easter or whatever, within two weeks to three weeks we are going to see some extreme measures in place.

I bought some VEC and VSEC on recent lows.

This is the jokes thread LC, please don't post news here. Thanks.

If hundreds of millions or billions of people are infected with this, what is the chance it mutates and we start the whole thing all over again?

Because the Czech masks are self-made they don't have a valve and so are useful in protecting others if the mask wearer is infected. There are many 3M and similar masks with a valve, they protect the wearer but allow the spread of the disease. In that sense, it's better if everyone just wears Czech like masks or those cheap surgical masks.

How about this plan: Is the FED increasing liquidity significantly? Yes: buy. No: sell.

Feels to me right now like this is all misguided optimism and that because I'm so much up already I should just liquidate everything, but didn't sell a single share. Because. Greed.

"Jesus died for our sins, grandma died for the Dow."

Religious fundamentalism is a virus far worse than covid19 and for some religions, it hides in a normal-looking suit and tie.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/03/10/spacex-aiming-for-may-astronaut-launch-will-reuse-crew-dragon.html SpaceX is “gunning for May” to launch NASA astronauts on its first spaceflight with crew

There's something that really worries me; what if this virus was much worse? Where would we be now with the same lack of pandemic-response team that got dismissed and the same people in power that think it should all be left to the private sector? What about the next time? There WILL be a next time. Oh,and: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-china-cdc-exclusiv/exclusive-u-s-slashed-cdc-staff-inside-china-prior-to-coronavirus-outbreak-idUSKBN21C3N5 "The Trump administration cut staff by more than two-thirds at a key U.S. public health agency operating inside China, as part of a larger rollback of U.S.-funded health and science experts on the ground there leading up to the coronavirus outbreak, Reuters has learned." "Separately, the National Science Foundation (NSF) and the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), the global relief program which had a role in helping China monitor and respond to outbreaks, also shut their Beijing offices on Trump’s watch. Before the closures, each office was staffed by a U.S. official. In addition, the U.S. Department of Agriculture(USDA) transferred out of China in 2018 the manager of an animal disease monitoring program." "“We had a large operation of experts in China who were brought back during this administration, some of them months before the outbreak,” said one of the people who witnessed the withdrawal of U.S. personnel. “You have to consider the possibility that our drawdown made this catastrophe more likely or more difficult to respond to.”"

Some of the comments are hilarious.

Nicely written Vinod. If we're looking for this not to repeat itself, it's important not to focus the blame on Trump. His various actions including dispersing the pandemic response team have been supported by a circle of enablers. He cannot be where he is now without these people. Even if he is not re-elected, they would remain and would continue to cause harm. Worse, many of the citizens harmed by him and his enablers would still continue their support.

For as much as Trump hates the NYTimes, this is basically what he was advocating yesterday. One thing they mentioned during yesterday's press conference was gradually bringing people back to work by age category. First the under 40s, then the under 60s, and all the while protecting the over 70s. People seem to misunderstand that even if you don't die from this virus, it can get quite bad, and even healthy young adults (not that Americans are that healthy on average) that won't die can end up in the hospital taking space from people that would otherwise be saved, or have permanent damage from the virus (lungs, heart), or they can unknowingly infect people in their social circles/family units that are more at risk of death, or even just that they in turn end up taking even more medical resources when there's few to spare, etc. This is still exponential. We need the R0 to be under 1, ideally way under. Not keep it above 1 until hundreds of thousands are dying and millions have been extremely sick and a large unknown number has died from OTHER preventable/curable causes because the healthcare system was destroyed, and how long to rebuild a destroyed healthcare system? You re-open for containment AFTER you have majorly suppressed it, like in SK or China. You don't put an arbitrary deadline on it one week into it without any data on whether the current half-assed measures worked or what the hospital situation will be then. That's BONKERS. I'll keep reposting it because more people need to read it, but this is the way to do it with the least pain, the least economic damage: https://medium.com/@tomaspueyo/coronavirus-the-hammer-and-the-dance-be9337092b56 Well said. It's also worth mentioning that while this is going on people still get heart attacks and strokes and all sorts of other minor issues that can turn serious if medical care is not received. When some die or are permanently damaged because of lack of medical care, due to non-corona-related issues, it's not recorded in the statistics.

El-Erian mentioned a few times forced-selling on twitter. Is this just an assumption he's making or is he able to see it technically, such as from the size of sell blocks? Would specific brokers auction large blocks or dump them so you can see it's forced selling?

Not now.

I'd just like to point out, before they go limit down again, that at this moment in time the futures are actually positive.

USA economy can reach positive GDP quite quickly by boosting local demand and protecting it from external economies. Demand means money going straight to households and via large infrastructure projects. The GOP proposed package is not going in this direction, but if the Dems get their way, it might just happen. Demand is not going to come from the second-largest economy in the world, or all these other economies teetering on the brink of the abyss. It has to be created at home. No other way this time around. Creating local demand also means debt-forgiveness and incentives, so SMEs can actually reopen quite quickly as long as the demand exists it will support their growth. This is not 2008. Also, there's serious pent-up housing demand, unlike 2008. Housing can provide a tremendous push, of course as long as all the conditions are met... people need the money to buy. I would not worry about inflation for half a second.

Probably by a lot.

My understanding from your posts is that we should buy this week.

There are three providers, not two and there are plenty of technical reasons for such a drop, such as indeed a switch of provider due to 5G or new regulations or store closing/not selling services, or businesses not renewing/buying numbers for spam purposes etc.

A lot of the expected horrors + the uncertainties are already priced in. Once the real situation starts to surface it would reduce uncertainty which should boost prices, at least for a while. This is not an act of god, it is man-made and men or women can and will fix it. Bailouts might start within days. Russie might succumb to SA. Cash will be given directly to households. Massive testing is highly effective. Potential drugs and vaccines, probably sooner than expected. Households QE is exactly what the economy needed to begin with. Maybe they'll start massive infrastructure projects because of all the unemployed, again, exactly what the USA needs. Banks went into this with sold balance sheets. Lots of good stuff can happen within a month or two. Having said that, of course, the negative impact on economies is real and would be long-lasting.

I agree testing is key and it will be a game-changer. Can it work efficiently without everyone wearing masks, though? It's so contagious.

The next employment report will be released on April 3rd, right? The unemployment numbers...

alwaysdrawing, For me, major banks refer to commercial banks, not investment banks.