Friday, January 29, 2021
Fears as Germany rejects AstraZeneca vaccine for over-65s
A vaccine war in Europe has intensified with Germany refusing to give the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine approval for use in people over 65.
A vaccine war in Europe has intensified with Germany refusing to give the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine approval for use in people over 65.
In Britain, the Oxford jab has made up a substantial part of 7.5 million vaccinations so far, mainly in those over 70, as well as younger health care workers.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson rejected Germany’s assessment, based on trial data, saying that the Oxford jab provides a “provides a good immune response across all age groups”.
Germany’s shock health decision comes after days of moaning from European Union leaders about access to the Oxford vaccine, with AstraZeneca warning it was unlikely to meet the EU’s 100 million dose order by the end of March.
The EU has demanded that Britain divert its supplies to help fill its order.
Germany’s decision was pinned on a lack of over 65s involved in the Phase 3 clinical trials, which Public Health England’s Dr Mary Ramsay acknowledged on Friday morning Australian time.
But she said other data had been reassuring, as Britain continued with its big bet on the Oxford rollout, which has been gathering pace and reaching up to 500,000 people each day.
Mr Johnson said he does not agree with the German ruling, as he backed the advice from the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA).
When asked if he was worried about Germany’s move, he replied: “No, because I think the MHRA, our own authorities have made it very clear that they think the Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccine is very good and efficacious, gives a high degree of protection after just one dose and even more after two doses.
“And the evidence they’ve supplied is they think it’s effective across all age groups and provides a good immune response across all age groups.”
The European Medicines Agency (EMA) was expected to approve the vaccine for use in the EU on Friday, although it is not yet clear whether it will set an age limit.
But the German authorities said: “There currently is not sufficient data to assess the vaccination effectiveness from 65 years.”
Oxford University, which partnered with AstraZeneca to develop the vaccine, has stressed that its jab offers high protection against severe disease and prevents people needing to go to hospital.
“The latest analyses of clinical trial data for the AstraZeneca/Oxford Covid-19 vaccine support efficacy in the over 65 years age group,” AstraZeneca said in a statement.
“We await a regulatory decision on the vaccine by the EMA in the coming days.”
A Phase 3 Lancet study published in December said older age groups had been recruited later into the study so “efficacy data in these cohorts are currently limited by the small number of cases, but additional data will be available in future analyses”.
In that particular analysis, only 12 percent of people given two doses of the vaccine in the UK arm of the trial (285 out of 2,377) were aged 56 to 69, while 9 per cent (213) were over 70.
Some 12 percent of people in the control group (given a dummy vaccine) were also aged 56 to 69 while 9 per cent were over 70.
Older people made up similar proportions in the Brazilian section of the trial, which was made up of 4,088 people.
Previous work published in November included findings for 560 people. Of these, 160 were aged 18 to 55, 160 were aged 56 to 69, and 240 were 70 or older.
Those results found that all age groups, including older people, had an immune response to the vaccine after two doses.
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Populism Is Engulfing Wall Street…And They’re Not Happy About It
Harrison is a good friend of the Triggered Podcast and his tweet pretty much sums what’s happening on Wall Street: “Populism is contagious.” Yes, a few smart randos on a Reddit thread, ‘wallstreetbets,’ decided to exercise their right to free speech and only boost the stock price of GameStop through the roof.
It cost hedge fund firms, who were trying to keep the price low, tons of money—billions of dollars were just roasted. If you need a visual comparison, think the Joker lighting that mountain of money on fire in The Dark Knight. Some hedge funds got wiped out. I have another media reference for what’s happening—sort of—and it centers on the ending of Trading Places with Dan Ackroyd and Eddie Murphy manipulating the market of frozen concentrate orange juice. It’s that scene, but in reverse—and yes, those margin calls can be quite steep. They have been quite steep. As a Mets fan, I know new owner Steve Cohen, who serves as the basis for the character Bobby Axelrod on Showtime’s Billions, will be okay. That doesn’t negate the fact that his hedge fund lost a ton of money in the past few days.
Look, a few small-time guys are beating Wall Street. They’re making some money—and the big wigs aren’t happy. The power of the people is screwing the folks who are rigging the system. And now, that’s a problem. How dare the little guy make some scratch by conducting some trades? How dare they? This is our playground. Well, everyone has a plan until you get punched in the mouth. So far, some of the stocks targeted for this money train ride are AMC Theaters, Nokia, GameStop, and a couple of others. It’s a financial ‘storming of the Bastille,’ which I wholeheartedly endorse. Even Barstool's Dave Portnoy is getting in on the action
A real estate salesman in Valparaiso, Ind. A former line cook from the Bronx. An evangelical pastor and his wife in Huntington Beach, Calif. A high school student in the Milwaukee suburbs.
They are among the millions of amateur traders collectively taking on some of Wall Street’s most sophisticated investors — and, for the moment at least, winning. Propelled by a mix of greed and boredom, gleefully determined to teach Wall Street a lesson, and turbocharged by an endless flow of get-rich-quick hype and ideas delivered via social media, these investors have piled into trades around several companies, pushing their stock prices to stratospheric levels.
[…]
On Wall Street, individual investors are often derided as “dumb money,” destined to lose against the highly compensated analysts and traders who buy and sell stocks for a living. But in recent days, individual investors — many of them followers of a popular, juvenile, foul-mouthed Reddit page called Wall Street Bets — have upended that narrative by banding together to put the squeeze on at least two hedge funds that had bet that GameStop’s shares would fall.
While the hedge funds and other professional money managers had been shorting GameStop’s shares, betting that its stock was doomed to further decline, the retail investors — online traders, mom-and-pop investors, small brokers and others — have been pushing the other way, buying shares and stock options. That caused GameStop’s market value to increase to over $24 billion from $2 billion in a matter of days. Its shares have risen over 1,700 percent since December. Between Tuesday and Wednesday, the market value rose over $10 billion.
[…]
Ben Patte, 16, a high school student in Wisconsin who said he made $750 off GameStop stock, said the campaign felt like vindication for himself and fellow young traders. “It’s a good opportunity to make money and stick it to the hedge funds,” he said. “By buying GameStop, it’s kind of like beating them at their own game.”
No one knows how this ends. Some analysts say the intense activity could eventually prompt a wider sell-off in the market by forcing hedge funds on the losing side of these trades to sell parts of their portfolios to raise cash to cover their losses.
Yeah, those poor billionaires. How will they ever live now? Also, it’s hilarious to see the NASDAQ CEO make suggestions that trading be halted so the elites can recalibrate their standing in the market. This right here is one of the many reasons why Trump won. Believe it or not, there are significant Trump and Bernie supporters who feel the economic system is rigged and the elites are trash. Well, this is exhibit A in that regard. Also, Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-CA) husband bought $50,000 in stocks that weren’t disclosed. But it’s okay—she’s willing to pay a fine. Two separate rules, except it’s between the wealthy and well-connected and the little guys.
Best of luck, guys. Keep making them pay.
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UPDATE: The Elites Fight Back
Well, all good things come to an end. Yet, that usually doesn’t come with a hefty side of corruption. As Leah wrote this morning, Robinhood app, which allows ordinary folks to participate in the stock market, pretty much froze trading on the stocks being targeted by WallStreetBets by removing those companies from the app. Again, how dare the little guy make some money after using the very same pump and dump schemes the big hedge funds use. How dare they? And then, the elite strikes back like this by limiting Robinhood app users' participation in the market—and people wonder why populism is on the rise. Why Trump won. And why folks act crazy at times. We all talk about market manipulation. This is it in its purest, most corrupt form.
These elite hogs set off a dirty bomb inside Wall Street today. It's a total and complete atrocity.
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GameStop stock price crashes as Robinhood app restricts trading
GameStop shares have sunk as trading platforms including Robinhood and Interactive Brokers restricted trading in the video game retailer along with AMC Entertainment, Blackberry and other stocks that soared this week in a social media-driven trading frenzy that shook stock markets.
GameStop, the US video game chain whose 1,700 per cent rally has been at the heart of a battle between small scale "retail" investors and hedge funds over the past week, lost half its value in early trading.
Having finished Wednesday's session at $US347.51 a share, GameStop plunged to $US265 when the New York Stock Exchange opened last night, ending the day down 44 per cent at $US193.60.
However, the company's share price rallied in after-hours trade when Robinhood released a statement after the NYSE's close saying that it would allow "limited buys" of the securities it had suspended from trade.
"Starting tomorrow, we plan to allow limited buys of these securities," the company announced on its "Under the Hood" blog. "We'll continue to monitor the situation and may make adjustments as needed."
GameStop shares had previously jumped more than 1,000 per cent in the past week, driven primarily by retail investors trading on online apps and sharing tips on social media messaging boards.
Such gains have forced short-sellers to buy back stock to cover potential losses in what is dubbed a "short squeeze".
On Reddit board WallStreetBets, where calls to buy stocks have helped drive the extraordinary moves, some of its more than 4 million members reported trading platform Robinhood was now preventing investors from buying GameStop and other volatile stocks.
In a statement on its website, Robinhood said the restrictions were necessary to comply with Securities and Exchange Commission financial requirements given the recent volatility in these stocks. It said restricted stocks also included BlackBerry, Koss and Express.
It was quickly hit with a class-action lawsuit alleging that as many as 10 million people may have "lost out on earnings opportunities" as a result of Robin Hood's move.
Interactive Brokers, another online trading platform, also said it was restricting trading in those stocks. "We do not believe this situation will subside until the exchanges and regulators halt or put certain symbols into liquidation only," Interactive Brokers said.
On Twitter, many observers decried the decision to remove certain stocks, arguing the retail trading platforms were trying to protect Wall Street interests at the expense of Main Street.
"Robin Hood: a parable about stealing from the rich to give to the poor. Robinhood: an app about protecting the rich from being short squeezed by the poor," tweeted Jake Chervinsky, a lawyer for fintech company Compound.
The decision to halt trading on the platforms was also condemned by US politicians from opposite ends of the political spectrum, with Republican Senator Ted Cruz retweeting a tweet from Democratic congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez labelling Robinhood's move "unacceptable" and flagging the possibility of a congressional investigation into the issue.
However, Robinhood has defended its actions, saying they were taken purely due to regulatory requirements and not at the behest of big Wall Street players.
"To be clear, this was a risk-management decision, and was not made on the direction of the market makers we route to," the trading platform wrote on its blog.
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