FTSE 100 jumps on hopes of coronavirus drug breakthrough April 17, 2020 The FTSE 100 surged today despite dire Chinese economic data as investors are cheered by hopes of a medical breakthrough and signs that the US is on its way to reopening parts of its economy. Britain’s FTSE 100 index finished 2.8 per cent higher at 5,786 points. It had climbed as much as 3.4 per [...]
Donald Trump set to lay out ‘guidelines’ for reopening US April 16, 2020 US president Donald Trump is tonight expected to release medically-approved guidelines to reopen parts of the country’s economy, which has been decimated by the coronavirus pandemic. A White House official said that the president would use this evening’s press conference to lay out the “recommendations”, which are “flexible and data-driven”. The official added that the [...]
Coronavirus: New York extends lockdown to mid-May April 16, 2020 New York will extend restrictions on schools and businesses until 15 May as the number of deaths and hospitalizations from coronavirus fell to their lowest levels in over a week. The number of deaths reported today fell to 606, the lowest level in 10 days, while the number of people admitted to hospital fell below [...]
BoE rate-setter: Economy to take ‘extremely large’ hit and inflation to dip April 16, 2020 The UK economy is likely to take an “extremely large” hit from coronavirus and inflation is probably going to to dip below one per cent, one of the institution’s nine rate-setters has said. The Bank has so far slashed interest rates to a record low, started buying up companies’ short-term debt and boosted its bond-buying [...]
Coronavirus: 761 more deaths in the UK as confirmed cases near 100,000 April 15, 2020 A further 761 people have died of coronavirus in the UK, the Department of Health has announced, taking the total death toll to 12,868 as of yesterday evening. The figure is a tiny decrease on yesterday’s figure of 778 deaths. The total number of new confirmed cases rose by 4,605, taking the UK to the [...]
HS2 construction work set to begin despite coronavirus lockdown April 15, 2020 Construction work on controversial rail project HS2 has been given the green light to begin despite the current coronavirus lockdown restrictions. The high speed rail link was approved by Prime Minister Boris Johnson in February after uncertainty about whether it would go ahead at all. Work on the four work packages, which involve many of [...]
She speaks for the President—but is anyone listening? April 14, 2020 Last week a snippet of news dropped into my inbox, announcing that Donald Trump had taken time out of his busy schedule of bullish-if-confused press conferences to announce a new White House press secretary (the fourth since he was sworn in at the beginning of 2017, if anyone’s counting). Number three, Stephanie Grisham, thanked the [...]