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Our briefing for Wednesday, December 22, 2021:
Dec 22, 2021 3:22:35 PM
- The United States’ Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have authorized the first pill against COVID-19 that is designed to be taken at home to help with the worst side effects from the virus. The long-awaited milestone comes from drugmaker Pfizer and is called Paxlovid – a faster, cheaper way to treat early COVID-19 infections, though initial supplies are expected to be extremely limited. In Pfizer’s trial results, the drug has brought on mild side effects, but superior effectiveness – including a nearly 90% reduction in hospitalizations and deaths among patients most likely to get severe disease. The pill is also expected to be effective against all current COVID-19 variants – including Omicron - because they don’t target the spike protein where most of the variant’s worrisome mutations reside.
- Canada’s federal government intends to temporarily extend the eligibility of several coronavirus related support programs, due to the Omicron surge happening throughout the country. Speaking at a press conference on Wednesday, Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said through regulatory powers, Ottawa will make changes to the Local Lockdown Program and Canada’s Worker Lockdown Benefit. The local lockdown program will include employers subject to provincial restrictions that have seen capacity restrictions of 50% or more. Before the announcement, the worker lockdown benefit only applied to regions where a COVID-19 lockdown order has been designated, which as of Wednesday, no regions in Canada have that distinction.
- Media news source Politico are reporting United Kingdom government scientists are set to report real-world data on the severity of the Omicron variant. Government scientists are reportedly set to state those with the Omicron variant are less likely to get severely sick compared to those with the Delta variant. However, due to the amount of people contracting the Omicron variant, the mildness doesn’t necessarily mean the UK will be able to avoid large number of hospitalizations. Also on Wednesday, after thinking the country might have turned a corner, the UK reported 106,022 new cases of coronavirus, the first time the number has passed the 100,000 mark since testing during the pandemic began.
- Israel will become the first nation in the world to offer their citizens a fourth dose of a coronavirus vaccine. People over the age of 60 and medical personnel will be administered a fourth dose in what country health officials are calling a “calculated risk” as due to being the first, there is no data available to back up the efficacy of a fourth jab. Israel’s public health chief, Sharon Alroy-Preis even protested at a meeting of government officials and medical experts that a trial at the country’s leading hospital hadn’t yet been carried out.
- The World Health Organization (WHO) is becomingly increasingly frustrated with countries such as Israel, noting no country is going to booster their way out of this pandemic. “Blanket booster programs are likely to prolong the pandemic, rather than ending it, by diverting supplies to countries that already have high levels of vaccination coverage, giving the virus more opportunity to spread and mutate,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said during a Wednesday news conference. Global health experts say the emergence of the Omicron variant is tied to vaccine inequality and the WHO estimates just half of its member states will have vaccinated at least 40% of their populations by the end of 2021.
- Australia’s leaders, including their prime minister, are saying their citizens should be wearing masks indoors, but stopped short of mandating them as coronavirus cases continue to climb. “Wear a mask in an indoor setting. You don’t need to be forced to do it, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said. There’s no confusion about it, just wear one.” The Australian Health Protection Principal Committee (AHPPC) has urged the country’s leaders to bring back mask mandates to protect the country from the Omicron variant, but Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly, who leads the expert group, said it was up to states and territories to decide how to get people to wear masks.
Covid-19 – Due Diligence And Asset Management
Private Equity Raises Real Estate Money too Fast to Spend it
Brief: Private equity real estate investors are raising money faster than they can spend it. U.S. funds have amassed a record $287.8 billion for commercial-property deals, according to Preqin. That’s up 11% from a year earlier and 57% more than at the end of 2019. The pileup of capital affirms the bet that real estate’s rally will continue while inflation rises, stocks wobble and bond returns lag -- and despite new Covid 19 variants that could threaten a comeback for offices, hotels and malls. U.S. property investment volume is expected to rise by 5% to 10% next year as firms try to spend down their dry powder, according to CBRE Group Inc. Private equity giant Blackstone Inc. raised $33.5 billion for real estate deals in the first three quarters of this year while deploying only $25.3 billion. The challenge is that clients -- pensions, endowments, high-net-worth individuals -- are hungry for more. “Investors view real estate as a safe place to be in an inflationary and low-rate environment,” Nadeem Meghji, Blackstone’s head of America’s real estate, said in an interview. The volume of cash chasing deals helped drive up U.S. commercial-property prices an average of 18% in the 12 months through November, led by a 22% jump in warehouses and other industrial real estate, according to Real Capital Analytics Inc. An expected surge of distressed deals hasn’t materialized, freezing deployment of more than $91 billion in dry powder.
Cantor Fitzgerald says Staff Bouncing Back Quick from Omicron
Brief: The omicron variant is causing a deluge of covid cases across Wall Street but a top Cantor Fitzgerald LP executive says he expects firms to weather the storm. Pascal Bandelier, global head of equities at the brokerage, said the wave of cases hitting Wall Street workers aren’t proving too severe so far. “I’d say most banks experienced more cases last week than we’ve seen in the last six months combined,” Bandelier said in a phone interview. “The good news is all the employees are exhibiting mild symptoms, which I think is consistent with everything we’re hearing.” The number of people in financial centers has tumbled as omicron takes hold, according to an analysis by Orbital Insight, which monitors activity through satellites and mobile phone data. In the City of London, foot traffic fell on Dec. 15 to 28% of a February 2020 baseline, compared to about 50% at the start of December. Cantor has told staff they can choose to work from home or one of its remote offices until at least early January. Just weeks ago about 60% of employees were back in its New York office, Bandelier said. But he sees reasons for optimism.
Omicron Could at Least Double the risk of Catching COVID-19 on a flight, Airline Industry Medical Expert says
Brief: Omicron could double the risk of catching COVID-19 during a flight according to an airline industry medical expert, who warned that the airport carries a higher likelihood that the virus could spread than on the airplane itself. The highly transmissible Omicron variant has been confirmed in more than 100 countries and has quickly become the most common cause of new COVID-19 cases in the US and South Africa."Whatever the risk was with Delta, we would have to assume the risk would be two to three times greater with Omicron, just as we've seen in other environments," Dr. David Powell, medical advisor at the International Air Transport Association, told Bloomberg Tuesday. "The relative risk has probably increased, just as the relative risk of going to the supermarket or catching a bus has increased with Omicron," Powell added. Powell said that the risk of catching COVID-19 caused by the Delta variant on a flight had been "low," though the exact level of that possibility had been unclear. Most of the data about the transmission of the virus on aircrafts was from March 2020 before there was easily available testing, masks, organized boarding procedures, and a high degree of awareness about not flying if you were unwell, he said.
COVID 19: Prepare for the Transition from Pandemic to Endemic
Brief: Beta, delta, omicron. Each emerging variant of the SARS-COVID-2 virus (the virus that causes COVID-19) sparks some market uncertainty as investors brace for the potential impact. It’s important to pay attention to new variants, but I think investors should plan for a longer-term scenario: a prolonged transition from pandemic to endemic conditions. According to the CDC, endemic viruses maintain a constant presence in the absence of intervention. The common cold is one example. COVID-19 is likely to become endemic, but not until public health agencies can safely lift all interventions. Below, I’ll explain why this process could take a long time and share the potential implications for the global economy…
Wells Fargo Delays Plans for Employee Return to Office Amid Omicron Surge
Brief: Wells Fargo & Co said on Tuesday it has delayed its plans for employees to return to the office "given the changing external environment," according to a statement, the latest bank to adjust plans as the Omicron variant spreads. The bank said it will announce new plans for a full return in the new year. Wells Fargo had earlier set Jan. 10 for a mandatory return for many employees, including those who support business lines. About 100,000 employees have been reporting to Wells Fargo locations throughout the pandemic, and offices are open to those who have been vaccinated and chose to use them, the company said. The bank had 254,000 employees at the end of September. Wells Fargo's announcement is one of the latest changes to staffing plans of U.S. financial companies for coming out of the pandemic.
