As investors think about which stocks to hold going into 2021, there may be no bigger red flag than a huge third-quarter earnings beat. That's because of what the pandemic has done to consumer behaviors and corporate earnings this year — impacts that may turn out to be more transitory than real…
The latest spike in coronavirus cases and hospitalizations has people worried about more than just the public health impacts. There's also the threat that renewed constraints on activity could drag the economy backward as we head into colder winter months.
Air travel is one kind of in-person…
Ahead of Friday's jobs report, evidence has grown to suggest that while total US unemployment remains high, the manufacturing and construction industries may be poised for the kind of V-shaped recovery that we haven't seen in decades. This won't help the job prospects for bartenders in New York…
There's been a lot of talk about the US experiencing a K-shaped recovery, with large companies and the rich recovering while smaller companies and lower-paid service workers struggle. But this divide also shows up in the way Americans are shopping.
July personal spending data confirmed a…
As the calendar turns to May, we're likely to see a slow return of growth for some types of economic activity that were wiped out by the coronavirus shutdowns in March and April. That's the good news. The bad news is, as we've seen in the oil industry this week, much of the economy remains…
The question on the minds of American workers in April will be when can we turn the economy back on. The underlying assumption in that question is that there will come a point when we can re-create the economy we had before the coronavirus forced the closing of large parts of the country. Although…
Internet-enabled industry disruption defined business strategy in the 2010s, but as 2020 begins, that era appears to be winding down. The disruptors have largely become the new establishment, and unlike a decade ago, it doesn’t look like the new leaders will be displaced any time soon. Today’s…
The economy has battled a lot of headwinds during the past year. Trade wars. The lagging impact of the Federal Reserve's interest-rate hikes. A government shutdown. The good news is that with those hiccups mostly out of the way, the economy may be poised for better performance in 2020.
The…
Tax reform early this year was expected to bring a windfall to corporations and the wealthy, but we’re finding instead that 2018 has been great for workers and, on some measures, the worst year for investors in decades.
While it may be a few years until we get detailed data, early indicators…
America is falling out of love with tech. For the first time since the dot-com bust in 2001, this year we’ve seen a broad cultural backlash against the tech industry, culminating perhaps with the recent rout of tech stocks. Tech has become such a part of everyday life and such an engine of society…