On a personal level, it is the only question I have been asked all week. So, markets and investors will get their “Santa/Christmas rally” by the looks of it. Unsurprisingly in New York, therefore, equities powered higher along with oil, and the US Dollar staged a sharp retreat as defensive positioning was unwound, although the bond market was sharply unchanged. Markets don’t concern themselves with these sorts of “slapping you in the face” details if the headlines agree with the narrative that they want to hear. Of course, with case numbers exploding across the world, the sheer volume of omicron cases means that for health systems, omicron could mathematically and statistically be a zero-sum game versus omicron. Mostly, it was Scottish and Imperial College London’s studies that back up preliminary South African data, suggesting that omicron is far more contagious than delta, but much less likely to put you in hospital. A cocktail containing better US Q3 GDP data, along with positive omicron headlines further inoculated financial markets against a year-end sell-off overnight.

Omicron storm in a teacup