The Week Everything – And Nothing – Changed
What a week!!!
Seriously. As last week wrapped up I was pretty darn confident: Biden win stoked hopes of stimulus packages without tax cuts and ushered in an early bottom for gold. The price running from US$1,866 per oz. as high as US$1,956 on Friday seemed evidence enough, especially since the gain pushed gold up through a descending wedge.
And then came Monday and news of the vaccine. Pzifer and partner BioNTech announced that early results of its COVID vaccine yielded 90% efficacy, with little evidence so far of negative side effects. Hopes had been for 50 to 60% efficacy so 90% blew everyone’s socks off.
(Because I’m a scientist at heart, here’s the situation in a bit more detail. It’s a 44,000-person trial. Half got the vaccine; half got saline injections. Since the trial started 94 of the 44,000 have gotten COVID-19. Of the 94, only 9 had received the vaccine: 9/94 is the 90% efficacy rate. It will take a few more months for the numbers to get big enough for statistical significance but this is a very strong result at this stage – and the surge in cases around the world will ironically shorten the time
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