Monetizing the virus

[Philip]

Nik wrote: "Procurement seems to be a major problem: https://thecity.nyc/2020/04/millions-......"

It would be nice if press reporting understood the complexities of delivering millions of items at short notice with most of the world's economies in some type of lockdown

[Nik]

When cash is king, why not use it to buy up some cheapies, which happen to be good old oil companies, shipyards and those so unsexy trad industries? https://www.ft.com/content/3facc407-2...

[Ian]

I am with Philip on this one. Add to this the guys making things, when they can't get on ingredient/part whatever because that particular supplier is locked down. Getting out of this mess is going to be difficult.

[Papaphilly]

Philip wrote: "Nik wrote: "Procurement seems to be a major problem: https://thecity.nyc/2020/04/millions-......"

Nobody cares about the complexities when they cannot get their masks.

[Philip]

Reports criticising the UK for not joining an EU PPE and ventilator procurement scheme - resurfaced during the why is there no PPE debate loved by the media, followed by why didn't UK work with EU.

EU scheme has just completed contracts and submitted first orders - deliveries zero... EU is also hoping to announce an aid package for hardest hit countries (in EU) today after formally apologising to Italy last week for poor response

BBC's own estimate is hospitals needed 10-16m items per day (great accuracy) delivery figures show 14m items being delivered - a staggering effort

On Ian's comment ref ingredients I understand that the main swab test has 75 components and some of the chemicals were in international short supply (no demand) before the crisis started, but that could be fake news...

[Nik]

Virus is not necessarily bad for big biz, as the coming reports reveal: https://nypost.com/2020/04/23/america...

[Ian]

Bezos' wealth will continue because Amazon thrives as the bricks and mortar stores have trouble. Musk may have more trouble - who is going to afford a Tesla?

[Papaphilly]

Ian wrote: "Bezos' wealth will continue because Amazon thrives as the bricks and mortar stores have trouble. Musk may have more trouble - who is going to afford a Tesla?"

When the world gets through this, the economies will roar fast.

[Ian]

I am not so sure. I think it is quite likely to come out differently, and when that happens, people tend to progress by feeling their way. There's also going to be a rather large debt that everyone has to work out what to do with, and there will be a cost to whatever option. There is no free lunch here.

[Philip]

I'm not ruling ot debt right off coordinated around G20. If governments can make money by quantitative easing then they can just as easily remove debt by debt easing/erasing

I appreciate it's more complex than that.

[Nik]

It all will depend on how much the households end up harmed as the result of the crisis because in the end somebody needs to buy whatever is produced to keep the things running. If the overall consumption shrinks and it's likely to happen then the return might not be that fast. Yellen voiced this concern in one of the recent interviews