On January 20th, Roger Kaplan , Sean McCarthy and Kelly Ann Sutton looked at "Covid and the DFW Economy." Roger reported that the pandemic has devastated the restaurant business throughout the US as well as in Texas which has lost 10,000 establishments and 250,000 employees. He predicted that a recovery will not come sooner than late 2021 when vaccination rates become much higher.
Kelly Ann, a member of our club and regional manager for Anthropologie stores, stated that the stores she oversees have experienced a drop in "in store" shopping but that when they reopened in May a new safety protocol was implemented which keeps premises extremely clean with distancing, masks and minimum touching.A number of stores have become distribution centers for on line purchases. Anthropologie is holding its own and the fact that its female customers enjoy in person shopping is a bright spot for its future.
Sean, the regional chief investment officer for Wells Fargo Private Bank, is bullish on the future of stocks in the markets. Too bad that not all Americans own shares. He predicts that the economy as a whole will remain bumpy through the first half of 2021 but that manufacturing in Texas will make a steady recovery throughout the year although retail sales are likely to remain flat.
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