Good afternoon,

 

Markets had a good week, based on positive news regarding COVID-19.

 

Honey I’m Home!

Somewhere tonight, maybe in a swanky upscale Cincinnati street, a Pfizer salesman stepped out of a shiny new car and walked through the front door with an extra skip in his step. He kissed his wife with the giddy passion of a drunken guppy after a pool party. He’s had a good week -- selling approximately a hundred billion gazillion vaccines to… the entire earth.

 

A bit more precise: The Pfizer and BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine candidate is great news. And if approved by regulators, the companies say they can produce 50 million doses this year, and up to 1.3 billion next year. Each treatment requires 2 doses, meaning some 650-700 million individuals could benefit by the end of 2021.

 

Dude, where’s my Needle? I’m anxious to see Canada on one of these lists soon… The main buyers are listed below

 

On a more positive note: there’s currently 10 more COVID-19 vaccine candidates in phase 3 trials and the hope is more good news is imminent. Watch for AstraZeneca-Oxford and Moderna to publish results before year-end.

 

Also this: After a baffling bistro of bureaucratic bungling, consider that these vaccines are free market solutions. Yes, the best minds in the business go where the money is (see above). Milton Freedman is giggling in his grave.

 

On a less positive note, the next challenge is to get people to take their medicine. An Ipsos survey shows a startling group of advanced countries where cheese is more important than life itself. This may well be an indication of the power of social media to deeply convince folks that (fill in basically anything here). And I have no punch line.

 

 

 

It’s a beautiful, snowy Friday, and one of the few times in the past four years I haven’t mentioned that guy everyone on earth is always talking about.

 

Enjoy your weekend!

 

Mark