Markets mixed, “economic reactivation will be very difficult”

Markets were mixed on Wednesday.

The S&P 500 rose 0.1 percent, the STOXX Europe 600 fell 0.1 percent and the Nikkei 225 fell 0.4 percent.

In his semiannual testimony before the House Committee on Financial Services on Wednesday, Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell reitered his view that the central bank can wait before it starts to ease its bond purchases despite surging inflation readings.

World Health Organization officials reported in a briefing on Wednesday that COVID-19 infections are rapidly rising again in the US and Latin America.

“Health and well-being must be prerequisites for reactivating the economy in the context of COVID-19 because if the pandemic is not brought under control, economic reactivation will be very difficult,” said Dr Carissa Etienne, director of the Pan American Health Organization, the WHO’s regional bureau for the Americas.