Though raising projections for overall economic growth over the next 2 years, the IMF warned this week that “an uneven rollout of vaccines” threatens to add to concerns about a “K-shaped” economic recovery on a global scale. Better said: “While many wealthy nations are poised for a major economic expansion this year, other nations’ struggles could reverse decades of progress in fighting poverty” - NYTimes and Marketplace and Bloomberg
JPMorgan chief Jamie Dimon agrees with the boom-times prediction. In his lengthy annual letter to shareholders out this morning, Dimon suggests the combo of “excess savings, deficit spending, vaccinations” and end-of-pandemic “euphoria” could create a years-long economic heyday in the U.S. - NYTimes and WSJ and Bloomberg
After a banner Monday, stocks slipped yesterday - WSJ and MarketWatch
Speaking of slipping, more on Credit Suisse’s already-terrible 2021 following the collapse of Greensill Capital and Archegos Capital Mgmt in the span of weeks. The bank took massive hits on both and finds itself in the unenviable position of struggling mightily “in an era of prosperity for investment banks” - Bloomberg and NYTimes
A bit of my childhood (and yours, perhaps?) is getting the full 2021 treatment on news that Topps trading card company “is going public by merging with a blank-check firm in a deal that values the company at $1.3 billion” - NYTimes and WSJ and Law360
Trade groups representing small businesses are “forming a national coalition to campaign for stricter antitrust laws” in an effort to push Amazon “to spin off some of its business lines” - WSJ and Marketplace
Wisk Aero, an electric aircraft startup backed by Google co-founder Larry Page, has accused rival start-up Archer Aviation “of stealing trade secrets and infringing on Wisk’s patents” - NYTimes and TechCrunch
Ireland’s Data Protection Commission—the “lead privacy regulatory” for Facebook in the EU—is probing whether “a recent leak of 533 million users’ personal data—including phone numbers and locations—contains evidence that the social media company violated data breach disclosure rules” mandated by the GDPR. Facebook has argued that the data was scraped before the blockbuster privacy law took effect, but newly released data appears to suggest otherwise – Law360
As part of GM’s push to go all-electric by 2035, the carmaker will roll out a e-version of its Chevy Silverado pickup truck with a planned 400 miles/charge capacity that would match its current range-per-tank-of-gas - WSJ and Mashable
Some Hollywood-based economic intrigue for us, with the SEC accusing actor Zachary Horwitz (aka Zach Avery) and his 1inMM Capital LLC company of running a $690 million Ponzi scheme based on fake deals to sell films to Netflix and HBO - Bloomberg
Enjoy the Last Week Tonight treatment on the National Debt, including the takedown you didn’t know you needed of a clock that’s very much not a clock - HBO
Stay safe,
MDR
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