Wheat has surge to its highest level since 2008. Corn prices have jumped around 25% so far this year touching their highest levels since March 2013. Aluminum and nickel have jumped to their highest levels in over a decade.
Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said a rate increase would be appropriate in March, and it’s too soon to tell how the war in Ukraine will affect the U.S.
Brent crude, the international oil benchmark, traded above $100 per barrel Thursday morning. Futures for West Texas Intermediate, the main grade of U.S. crude, topped $96 per barrel late Wednesday, putting them up 28% this year and 52% over the past 12 months, now at its highest level since 2014.
New research shows office reluctance is less about Covid-19 and more about convenience. As of this month, 61% of U.S. workers who telecommute most of the time are doing so by choice. Among this group, more than three-quarters simply said they prefer working from home.
SoFi is buying banking-software firm Technisys for about $1.1 billion, the latest in a string of deals designed to turn the lender into a one-stop financial shop.
When the Fed raised interest rates between 2015 and 2018, it did so gradually—and never more than once every quarter. Under the economic outlook they judged most likely last month, most officials last month “suggested that a faster pace of increases…than in the post-2015 period would likely be warranted,” the minutes said.
The average net worth of households headed by someone aged 55 to 64 rose by $180,095 between Jan. 1, 2020 and Sept. 30, 2021, an increase of 15.3%.
U.S. inflation accelerated last month to 7.5%, a new four-decade high.
Spirit Airlines and Frontier Group are merging in a cash-and-stock deal valued at $6.6 billion.
The world’s biggest shipping lines, flush with cash, are buying their own fleets of cargo planes and adding airlifts for big clients willing to pay extra to get around supply-chain snarls at sea resulting from the Covid-19 pandemic. Airfreight accounts for less than 1% of global trade by volume but 35% by value.
