Starting anew

Now could be a time for creative destruction as investors find value in the post-pandemic world, argues Keith Breslauer, managing director at Patron Capital.

It can be hard to see beyond a crisis when you are still going through it, but there are significant lights at the end of the tunnel from an economic perspective. Firstly, while government-imposed restrictions certainly had a major effect on economic activity, we believe that the rebound will be equally dramatic.

Capital Economics has said that considerable excess savings, the equivalent of €360 billion in the euro zone, were accumulated during the downturn. Following the successful roll-out of the vaccine and the subsequent escape from the perpetual purgatory of opening and closing the economy, the unleashing of these savings will dramatically increase GDP over the next one to two years.

Secondly, the agreement of a Brexit deal has mitigated much of the potential downside that some were factoring into t