Fears Over Long-Term Outlook, Delta Variant, Impacting Market

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">The Treasures fell by more than seven basis points today, highlighting fears around the Delta variant and inflation. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Short-term rates are up slightly from last week. However, the Consumer Price Index (CPI) and Producer Price Index (PPI) both released figures last week that were higher than estimates, indicating inflation in both categories. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Enhanced Child Tax Credits will soon lead to an increase in consumer spending, keeping inflation relatively high. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Meanwhile, oil prices are at their highest level since 2008. Economic growth is slow, while inflation continues to impact the economy. The big question is: For how long? </span></p> <h1><span style="font-weight: 400;">Concerns Around Long-Term Growth</span></h1> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">While plenty of recent headlines have focused on the Delta variant of COVID, Thirty Capital’s Analyst Jay Saunders believes: “I think we've got a grasp on COVID. I don’t think we're going into another lockdown that's going to slow the economy. This is really a concern over long-term growth outlook.”</span></p> <h1><span style="font-weight: 400;">Feds Not Raising Rates Anytime Soon</span></h1> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">Meanwhile, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell’s semi-annual report to Congress on the state of the U.S. economy was actually quite dovish, observes Thirty Capital’s CEO Rob Finlay. “He’s basically saying that we don’t need to raise rates anytime soon.”</span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">However, cautions Rob, the market has clearly shown this morning that there’s a flight from equities to Treasury bonds, and the ten-year is at 1.210. </span></p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">This sense of caution or possibly even fear is a combination of concern around inflation and also the impending impact of the Delta variant of COVID. </span></p> <p><span style="font-wei