But our hospitals are starting to get overcrowded again. That is not good. And this herd immunity path we are set on is not a good thing w this virus. This Virus attacks the body from head to toe, sometimes w permanent effects. I wish I could attach pdf files on covers, because The links to WSJ are pointless due to a required subscription.
To the question of what I would have done differently. I would have required mask use at any indoor setting across the country, hot spot or not, and required masks in any crowded outdoor setting, .... once we reopened. Also, and I mentioned this earlier in the thread actually, we really needed to use our time shut down much more effectively, with the testing/tracing significantly ramped up.
Certainly, Fauci and Birx share A LOT of the blame, too, perhaps moreso becausethir recommendations were followed to shut down. . Trump is no doctor , and felt the need to shutdown the economy based on the ( incorrect) models being fed to him.
We are probably more like Europe than any other developed society. When I saw the bell curve graph of cases from start to present, I had to look at it again. 
Europe had a slowly sloping bell curve trail from its peak, and really has it under control it seems , currently. Our case load has tripled from our previous peak , set in the throes of the crisis.
Maybe I'm off base, but I find it puzzling that the market hasn't factored in a Biden presidency as a result of what's happening. And if they do believe he will win, why his draconian policies wouldn't budge the market.
.... we shall see
Rush. Elections tend to spur the most volatile results regardless of the party that wins. In 2016 it was "suspected" that a Trump win would be bad for the markets. The night he won the election the futures had dropped over 1000 points. The next day a complete reversal occurred (or maybe it was a few days later, I can't remember).
Anyway, our old reliable (and by that I mean unreliable) polling sites had Hillary winning by a landslide and the markets were liking it until Trump pulled the upset. Then the markets hated Trump before rallying on the Trump victory.
It all remains to be seen, but Biden is more of a moderate (unless he is truly a puppet for the far left) so there is a chance that a Biden win will not kill the markets.
I hope you're right Gamble.. I just don't think Biden's cognitive skills are all there, and that he would become a puppet. Let's hope in the next 4 months something positive can happen. Ironically, the stock market seems about the only positive development in the news these days ! Lol.
I am going to post a whole lot of stuff in reply to your post and concerns.
I don’t want to turn this into the political forum because it is a mess over there.
I also do not want it to be a totally medical post or a science post.
But I think, along with economics, all 4 intersect somewhat right now.
People don’t change because of facts. Thy change because of feelings.
Farr’s Law is the best proven way of tracking a virus. You have to track the deaths. Look at New York for example, peaked way back in March. Quote that best describes it:
“Once peak deaths have been reached we should be working on the assumption that the infection has already started falling in the same progressive steps. Using deaths as the proxy for falling infections facilitates the planning of the next steps for reopening those societies that are in lockdown.”
Farr about death rate:
“The death rate is a fact; anything beyond this is an inference.” What’s his point? Deaths are the ONLY way to understand the path of a virus, and how close we are to snuffing it out. And, all over the world, it’s extremely clear that we are well-past peak deaths for COVID-19, no matter what you read in the press.
Oregon for example, look at Kate Brown and their situation. The actions do not reflect the true numbers. She is rolling back the shutdowns because of increase in cases. She is even considering not having in-person school. But look at their hospital visits in March — a small peak. Then had gone down to less than 1% of ER visits. At one time hospitalizations were 7 a day out of over 4M folks.
Now go look at a chart of their administered tests! From almost 1200 a day to close to 5000 a day!
I just can’t make this point strongly enough: positive cases in isolation are MEANINGLESS to track COVID-19.
Oregon is a good case study’s at this point because they have been very open about all of their Coronavirus data to the public. On July 1 they only had 3 people hospitalized for Coronavirus.
So, why the hysteria?
The only thing that has increased is the number of tests administered, which makes positive cases a meaningless metric.
If you think the lockdown had anything to do with when the virus peaked, the data doesn't support that idea. The data shows we peaked well before the lockdown would have had an impact, which is true for many places, because the virus has been present far longer than we knew. Just look at NY and Italy.
I contend it is the same nearly everywhere. But the USA is in a situation that is unique. We are in a tremendously media-driven era because of the election cycle coming up and because of the hatred of Trump and the urgency to see him fail, or at least make him look bad. By association we have affected nearly all of the world’s reaction as well.
Again: People don’t change because of facts. Thy change because of feelings. We have needlessly scared the folks — without the facts being accurate to back it up.
From BMJ sometime in May I think:
Protecting those at most risk of dying from covid-19 while relaxing the strictures on others provides a way forward in the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic, given the virus is unlikely to disappear in the foreseeable future.1 Such targeted approaches would, however, require a shift away from the notion that we are all seriously threatened by the disease, which has led to levels of personal fear being strikingly mismatched to objective risk of death.2 Instead, the aim should be to communicate realistic levels of risk as they apply to different groups, not to reassure or frighten but to allow informed personal decisions in a setting of necessary uncertainty.
Lockdown is seriously damaging many aspects of people’s lives, harming most those with the least resources. As constant vigilance will be required over the coming months and perhaps years, serious consideration should be given to implementing locally informed and implemented strategies to stratify shielding according to risk.
As one simple example: closing schools makes almost no sense given what we know about COVID-19, while protecting teachers over the age of 60—to pick a somewhat defensible age boundary—may well make sense. This is why so many countries who seem to respect data more than we do here in the U.S. have already re-opened their schools. In fact, Denmark’s schools have been open since mid-April!! And, for those keeping score, Reuters just reported yesterday that, “Reopening schools in Denmark did not worsen outbreak, data shows.”
There is little about coronavirus we can be absolutely sure of – this is a brand new disease and our knowledge grows by the day - but most of the available evidence so far strongly suggests that children are neither suffering from coronavirus nor spreading it. Studies in South Korea, Iceland, Italy, Japan, France, China, the Netherlands and Australia all concur that youngsters are “not implicated significantly in transmitting Covid”, not even to parents and siblings.
How many more countries need to re-open before the U.S. follows? Seriously, it’s a little embarrassing to be American…IMO we look like total chumps.
Namely, the study states:
“In our systematic review, we identified 10 RCTs that reported estimates of the effectiveness of face masks in reducing laboratory-confirmed influenza virus infections in the community from literature published during 1946–July 27, 2018….In pooled analysis, we found no significant reduction in influenza transmission with the use of face masks…Our systematic review found no significant effect of face masks on transmission of laboratory-confirmed influenza
Two different studies:
"There is no significant risk of catching the disease when you go shopping. Severe outbreaks of the infection were always a result of people being closer together over a longer period of time.
“When we took samples from door handles, phones or toilets it has not been possible to cultivate the virus in the laboratory on the basis of these swabs….”
One of B.C.'s top health officials, however, says medical professionals have a pretty clear picture of how the virus is transmitted. "There is absolutely no evidence that this disease is airborne, and we know that if it were airborne, then the measures that we took to control COVID-19 would not have worked," Dr. Reka Gustafson, B.C.'s deputy provincial health officer, told CTV Morning Live Monday."We are very confident that the majority of transmission of this virus is through the droplet and contact route…."The overwhelming majority of (COVID-19) transmissions occur through close, prolonged contact and that is not the pattern of transmission we see through airborne diseases," she said.
I asked what more Trump could have done. So I am going to assume that paragraph addressed that.
Even if I grant you the mandate of masks — you think it is Trump’s place or responsibility to make a national mask mandate?
I am not sure what more Trump could have done during the shutdown to increase the testing or tracing. These things are not on standby already and he cannot make them magically appear.
For example, there is no testing for the “Got-Us Again Flu of 2025”. These things have to be studied and developed. These are not directly under the purview of a sitting president — at least to me.
Trump under advice, mainly from intelligent advisors — not medical advisors — shit down the flights from China. We all saw the ugliness from the Left about that. We also know now that the Virus had more than likely been here well before that and was already gathering steam.
Now...I agree Fauci and Birx are at some fault.
You could, therefore, make the point that Trunp is at fault for following advice from them and the idiotic modelers!
But, in his defense, he was put in a No Win situation there as well.
Yes. New cases are way up for us and down for Europe.
However, at this time the 3Day RA for deaths is way, way down.
The 3Day RA for deaths/M are way, way down.
Both show the same slip ass EU does on these charts.
There is a slight flattening at the bottom and maybe even a very slight up tick.
But, again the Media is keying in on cases NOT deaths.
We also think there is some disparity on how we are counting deaths versus EU.
There is evidence of even double dipping on cases. If a patient shows antibodies — they are sometimes being counted as a positive case, even if they came in for elective knee surgery, showing no symptoms of Covid. Because everyone is tested now.
Why are they not counted as a fully recovered case?
On to the interesting things.
Like they say — one can never be truly sure of what moves the markets.
But there is some concerns in certain sectors now about a Biden presidency.
For example, several military-Type stocks have been underperforming, as of late.
There are a lot of questions, especially at the hedge fund level, being raised on the potential impacts on taxes if Biden wins.
This is coupled with the news that the Democrats have a chance at consolidated power with a takeover of the Senate.
Last I saw the analysis showed a 12% decline in earnings/share.
Of course, the energy sector is under great scrutiny in anticipation of a change in that policy.
The ones that do not seem to care are the tech and healthcare sectors.
They also figure that Biden would quell the back and forth with China — especially the talks of tariffs or no tariffs.
Maybe you saw the JPM analysis way back at start of pandemic. But I think still has some validity.
Basically, they say a Biden presidency coupled with a Republican Senate is the better option over a second Trump term.
Mainly for the reasons above. Stability and steady market friendly policies that the House could not completely get rid of.
This is the bottom line to me:
“Investors need to stay focused on the next 10 to 20 years, not the next 10 to 20 minutes,” Matson said on Yahoo Finance’s The First Trade. “As a matter of fact, all the the noble and predictable information about the future is factored in today [into stocks]. Therefore, only random and unpredictable information will change the market going forward. What I can say is we have done extensive studies — if it’s a Democratic or Republican president or if it’s a Democratic or Republican House or Senate — and over the last 70 years I can’t find any correlation between what party’s in office or not.”
I would like Trump for a lot of reasons and would like Biden for no reasons at all. But by and large the markets do not care who is president.
However, a mix of Congress and President does matter somewhat in the very short term:
Over a two-year period, the market does better following a Republican win (+8.3%) than a Democratic presidential win (+5.8%), according to numbers analyzed by Fidelity that go back to 1789. When Republicans sweep the House and Senate, the two-year average forward return for stocks is an impressive 12.2%. But when Democrats sweep, stocks return 3.4% over a two-year span.
I realize that is a lot of junk. I know you don’t like all the intensive reading of the links and quotes and analysis. So, I shortened it up — believe it or not.
But I think it is pretty well substantive evidence on the pandemic. I think we will study this for years and look back in disbelief at a lot of things.
I agree that Biden is not altogether. But if he surrounds himself with really good advisers I hope that he would do well. The issue is I just do not like hardly any Democratic policies because I prefer Republican, obviously.
But I do not think they would let him stay in if he became truly incapacitated. I do not even think they would’ve let him get this far if any other candidate had looked viable. The Democrats just do not have a great rallying person at this time. So, they have to rally as much anti-Trump support as they can.
Raiders... I think your most important point , that we will study this for years is such an important statement. This is all unprecedented to any of us here living in the western world. So many decisions will be 2nd guessed. There is no question about that.
As a Trump supporter, he could/should have been more aggressive in the process. In addition to the state of emergency he declared back in March, he opined several times that we are fighting an invisible enemy. He should have taken charge on a national level on the reopenings, etc. I already stated what should have been done before. Now, each state acted differently on the opening effort, and Walmart and Kroger are issuing mask requirements. Seriously, talk about a disjointed effort.
In a brief summary, in peacetime efforts, let the states do their thing as our founders intended. In wartime efforts , such as this, , the federal government needs to take charge. It's ironic , Trump is called Hitler by members of the left, .. but he should have been more aggressive in his reopening efforts...
In regards to the Virus, I look at it in 3 important phases ;
Cases, Hospitalizations, and deaths
I put Hospitalizations in bold because this number really can't be fudged, unless the virus mutates into a more deadlier form. So, this is what we should all be paying attention to. And if we are hitting capacity in hospital beds in areas, that should concern us, because it tells us the virus is spreading, particularly in the West and South. It is spreading aggressively...
Confirmed cases in itself doesn't tell the whole story, and can be influenced by variables such as increased testing as you already pointed out. Certainly, increased testing has contributed to an increase on the case load, but gives an incomplete picture. As an example, it's possible to have an increase in cases with a flat Hospitalization rate, but that ain't happening. When I see both cases AND hospitalizations spike, this should clearly tell us that we are not just simply "identifying" more people, more people are also going to the Hospital..... i.e. the virus is growing aggressively..
Deaths is also an area that has mortality rate as an important variable. We know that the mortality rate is actually getting better, as doctors get a better handle on what to / what not do, and improved treatments. So, tallying the number of deaths gives an incomplete picture. We could have a lot of people in the hospital, but fewer peopl dying.
People might be encouraged by this, but what debilitating effect are all those people going to have. As I mentioned in a previous post, this virus attacks the body from head to toe, sometimes w permanent effects.
Hospitalizations IMHO is the most important thing we should we paying attention to, and ironically enough , we hear more about testing and deaths which neither gives us a complete picture on its own...
”When we look back in 5 years time, I predict this will be the biggest "own goal" in modern economic history.”
What exactly do you mean by taking charge on openings?
You think he should’ve ordered places to close?! On what authority? You think he should’ve ‘encouraged’ the governors in a conference call to do it — including democratic ones? Is that even legal?
Maybe I missed exactly what you say he should have done?
What would be ‘aggressive’ to you — that he could legally do or influence?
Each state should act differently. No problem with that. Every state is not New York not every state South Dakota.
You cannot have a president deciding you have to wear a mask to Walmart. That is a dictatorship right away.
I actually wish he had — then these knuckleheads that are for it would have been instantly AGAINST it!
This is not a Trump issue. Not much he could’ve done. Except try to be positive and upbeat and encouraging. They took that as cavalier and uncaring.
But you really think he should have forced something on the folks using unproven — and wildly wrong — models?!
i am sorry. But, respectfully, this is absolutely incorrect.
I pointed this out in a few posts in detail. These can be double counted easily or even misreported.
The whole point in Farr saying what he said about tracking a virus and the path is that anything but deaths are inferred only.
Look at detail on the Oregon study I showed about the hospitalizations and their deaths.
I get what you are saying. But now folks are going back to the hospital for elective things and things they had been putting off because we did not want to overwhelm the hospitals. Now they go in and show they have a bad knee but also tested for the Covid antibodies. Not accurate at all. They are well from virus now. Just fix the knee and keep it moving.
The question is surely why the USA is doing that.
So we shall continue to disagree on the virus. It is overblown. Politicized and media-hyped.
And Trunp should not be the default scapegoat for not using bad models to illegally shutdown the economy.
Leaving that aside, as I understand most folks are scared to death because that is all they see and here — what did you think of the points on the market’s anticipation of a Biden win?
Yes, agree to disagree on the virus...
Onto the markets. Ordinarily , whoever is in office shouldn't be a factor in your portfolio decision making. That has been proven many times. However, it is also hard at the same time to accept that stocks shouldn't suffer when Biden has openly railed against the corporate tax rate, and lift it right back up.
Perhaps if there is a swoon in the stock market after his election ( or before, doesn't matter), it will be a good time to roll a traditional IRA to a ROTH IRA. Take advantage of a swoon AND known current (low) tax rates.
Concavecapital
I see APT hit 22.80 before closing at 21.60. Hope you stuck with it. Looking for the earnings to be real nice apparently:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/stocksregister.com/
2020/07/20/alpha-pro-tech-ltd-apt-is-worth-a-look
-now-despite-114-71-loss-from-high/amp/
https://www.google.com/amp/s/finance.yahoo.com/
amphtml/news/investors-interested-alpha-pro-tech-102726429.html
Yes, if this happens, we'll be looking at the same situation when O'bama won 2012.. Only this time, the policies adopted by DEMS will make O'bama look like a Centrist !!
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