Our main portfolio has now passed its pre Covid high. I haven‘t checked our 401Ks and other holdings but I assume they have come close to recovering by now.
The government released a positive jobs report today. It seems like the economy is already recovering and had the biggest job gain in many years (given that it is measured by the last two most terrible months in history). Unless we have a second Covid wave, the worst could be behind us. Maybe the economy will fix itself but if not more stimulus programs will be coming (they are talking about another $3 trillion in stimulus). The stock market recovered first because it always leads the main street recovery, sometimes by years. So things are looking much better now economically but I still think we have a long economic recovery ahead of us. Hopefully the government can put better policies in place so that a second Covid wave does not require mass shutdowns again.
I was always against the mass shutdowns. It was like a sledgehammer approach. I thought we should have had targeted shut downs, mass testing, quarantine the sick and most vulnerable, social distancing for all, and contact tracing (and hopefully a vaccine and treatments are on the horizon). I am fine with wearing a mask even though I am skeptical that masks work.
I am excited to follow the per capita testing data by country. The USA is testing more per capita than many Asian countries, Germany, Canada and New Zealand, and the USA is not too far behind Australia, Singapore and the major European countries. Maybe in Covid wave 2, we won’t need mass shut downs again and the economy will continue to recover. I hope the government learned from Covid wave 1.
I must say that the federal small business loan program has been a savior for my business. For that, I am very grateful. After 2.5 months of near economic destruction, we are finally seeing an uptick in business even though we are still shut down and all employees are still working from home.
I pray there will not be a Covid wave 2 of mass illness and death and we will not need to do another massive shut down.