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"In addition, in order to maintain stability in financial markets, the Bank has enhanced the U.S. dollar funds-supplying operations, actively purchased exchange-traded funds (ETFs) and Japan real estate investment trusts (J-REITs), and conducted further active purchases of Japanese government bonds (JGBs) and treasury discount bills (T-Bills)."

"The services sector has taken a much greater hit during the COVID-19 crisis than has typically been the case in past downturns, and it is the largest contributor to global GDP."

Balance sheet strength matters now more than ever

With lockdown continuing and the tone of news flow deteriorating, it can be hard to reconcile the recent bounce in equity markets with how we may feel personally.

There have been five major bear markets in the S&P since the Depression, with each one experiencing rallies along the way that turned out to be false dawns.

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In the autumn of 1910, the press in China began to report that a rare and deadly pneumonic plague had reached Harbin in the extreme Northeast of China, then known as Manchuria.

How creative artists in the 18th. and 19th. centuries adapted to the vast economic and social changes that occured around them during the greatest era of musical composition. A novel cross-disciplinary arena between music and economic history.

Economic cycles are driven by financial flows, namely quantities of savings and credits, and not by high street inflation or interest rates. Their sweeping destructive powers are expressed through Global Liquidity, a $130 trillion pool of footloose cash. Global Liquidity describes the gross flows of credit and international capital feeding through the world’s banking systems and wholesale money markets.

Looking at the chart below, however, makes me wonder whether I should've left this particular stone unturned.

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Stock market history can help frame your expectations.

Proportion of the population moving, compared to usual, over the most recent three weeks

The average congestion during the morning rush hour for the week ending 27th March, compared to the 2019 weekday average

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