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The Democratic candidate, Joe Biden, beat Republican Donald Trump in the recent US presidential election. It seems that the Congress will remain divided, with the House of Representatives in Democratic hands and the Senate in Republican hands. In this political environment and with the COVID-19 crisis ever present, what can we expect from US domestic and foreign policy in 2021?

The COVID-19 crisis would have led to a sharp increase in inequality if the actions taken by the public sector had not cushioned it to some extent. The high levels of inequality recorded during the peak of the crisis are gradually decreasing thanks to the recovery in business. 

For 2022 as a whole, the euro area’s trade balance in goods registered a deficit of around 60 billion euros (–0.5% of GDP vs. +2.3% in 2021). This was entirely due to the widening of the deficit in the energy balance, which doubled to exceed 500 billion euros, or around 4.5% of GDP.

The evolution of the middle class in Spain reflects a slight upward trend in recent years: according to the data, the percentage of the population belonging to this social stratum increased from 59.2% in 2007 to 61.1% in 2022. However, despite this slight growth, the perception is often the opposite.

At CaixaBank Research, we are not leaders in research into big data or artificial intelligence. However, we do try to keep an eye on the latest developments in this field in order to improve economic analysis, especially in those areas that are key in order for growth to be more dynamic, more inclusive and more sustainable in the long term.

Despite Spain’s tourism model being highly competitive, the recovery of the different types of tourists has been uneven. This article examines how the reasons for international visits have changed, comparing the current situation with that of 2019, in order to assess whether there have been significant shifts in consumption patterns that are relevant to the sector.

With disinflation on track and some signs of a slowdown in economic activity and a cooling of the labour market, monetary policy is shifting gears and starting to dial back the monetary tightening of the past years: going from restrictive to neutral. The ECB and the Fed, along with other major central banks, have initiated this easing process with interest rate cuts, and they are expected to continue doing so in 2025. From there, we will seek to clarify the factors that will guide this new phase of monetary policy.

The US labour market is cooling down. The Fed acknowledges it and the statistics confirm it: the unemployment rate has increased 0.7 pps so far this year and in June job creation hit its lowest levels since 2021. Should we be concerned?

To date, Spain has already complied with 70% of the reforms set out in the Plan, but only with 15% of the investments, partly because of the Plan’s very nature, which places more emphasis on the reforms in the first few years, and partly due to some initial delays in the implementation.

The string of supply and demand shocks triggered by the announcements of recent weeks will alter the balances of growth and inflation, while the expectations variable will modulate the effects that will be transmitted through the trade and financial channels. 

That being the case, for the moment, and while we wait for events to unfold, it seems that our economy ought to weather this period of uncertainty better than our main trading partners.

We examine the dynamics that have led to the gold rally, as well as the factors that influence the gold price in both the long and the short term, most notably the role central banks play in purchases of this precious metal.