in just a period of a couple of years. it's a classic american story in some ways. glad that you guys could come by and take a look around. so thanks again, and we'll see you later. -- captions by vitac -- hello and welcome to "street signs" i'm karen tso, these are your headlines today the world health organization says the global risk posed by the omicron variant is very high and urges member state to ramp up their vaccination programs. >> let's hope this is a dress rehere sal, because unless we move on vaccine equity, the virus will really develop something we are struggling to get ahead of. >> european markets bounce back from friday's selloff, with

travel and leisure leading the way. wall street also looking to open in the green pharma jumps and moderna said it could have a new vaccine ready by early 2022. japan announces plans to close its borders to foreigners on tuesday amid the spread of omicron but the supply chain squeeze is easing. >> it still are getting better by better step by step but we need to carefully to monitor and how to make sure we can have our business continue to plan, as an industry how we can support each other with a partnership is going to be very important european stock markets are open for the monday trade and it's certainly a step into the green versus the red that we closed up with on friday, violent selling across some of

the markets that also had a fairly strong month of november. so we saw a pullback, 4.7% on the french market, just over 4% on the dax you can see the morning session here, rebound .7% on the stoxx 600. into the green at the start of the trade, though. we are waiting to hear information about the impact on vaccines, whether what's been distributed already through many of the developed nations will work against this variant, but also big question marks around the transmissability and just how severe this variant will be. so what restrictions on the back of it? we're seeing a number of countries try to impose border controls again but we're waiting for the information and what this means around social distancing and the business activity we've seen on the back

of the pandemic. let's get into the markets so far we are tracking in the green modestly on the ftse, we have slipped under the 7,100 point mark so not witnessing the high ranges. the dax up about .75%. there were already concerns about the delta spread and whether restrictions would be required to protect the health services, but now with the variant on top of it, it is a tricky situation for the german market and economy in france, half a percent higher. the messaging has been strong from the french they want to keep the economy open, they are in election mode as we count down to april next year. so this is one we're watching for political ramifications. the italian market it is .6 higher you can see travel and leisure

is back into the green today, and it is a stronger print for iag in particular, this was one stock you saw strong selling that hit friday's session, down 20% initially recovering some of the territory in the trade and another 3% today along with the german airline trading up, and across some of the budget ones you have gains of almost 2% on some of the trades from easy jet to ryanair carnival one of the worst performing stocks on friday it's added 6.3% so a pick up there less on the boards for the hotels i want to take you to the vaccine makers the one we are closely watching here in europe is astrazeneca. it continues to slip pfizer has added 1.8 biontech 4.6 they're in germany and you can

see the trade expressed through the european market are firm for all the veens accines accept astrazeneca. the w.h.o. wants to ensure mitigation is in place the risk assessment associated with the omicron variant is quite high and that it could lead to future pandemic surges with severe consequences w.h.o. also urged countries to accelerate the vaccination programs and used a risk-based approach to international travel south african authorities are considering making vaccines come pulsery for some places after infections tripled in the past week. the president has said the newly emerged omicron variant is responsible for the spike in new cases but the government has not

imposed stricter lockdown measures, they've also criticized other countries including the uk and the u.s. for imposing travel restrictions what's the situation we're all looking to the southern african nations for how this plays out given the lack of information we have from scientists and medical experts >> thank you, karen. there's still a lot of anger in this part of the world about what some are calling the isolation of southern african by the rest of the world after the outbreak so we saw the president last night referring to that and calling for an end to the travel band that we're seeing countries imposing on south africa and the neighbors here as i'm speaking to you now, the minister of health is briefing the media on efforts to try to get the bans reversed.

he's been talking about the fact that what you are seeing is southern africa put in a corner while other places where there have been outbreaks have been left alone but at the same time, the government and authorities are engaging other authorities in other parts of the world who were made aware of that the minister of health has been in contact with the u.s. minister of health talking to him about the measures they are taking at the same time, we are seeing the authorities urging health professionals to the briefings they're holding with the media as a way to ensure the information they're putting out is backed by scientists. in addition to that we had the minister of foreign affairs of south africa engaging with antony blinken talking about south africa feels they're being

punished for the transparency and being excellence in the scientists in detecting this variant and sharing it with the rest of the world. so a lot of unhappiness about what has happened overnight but on the markets we are seeing a bounce back here and then we are also seeing on the markets the equities trend we are up more than 1% on friday, of course, we lost more than 2.7% because of the outbreak of that variant, karen. >> godfrey thank you for joining us with the update there much appreciated i want to take you to some developments from the world health assembly meeting. this is a key one, we are closely watching this session for the pandemic response and just what countries should be doing to prepare themselves at this point we just heard it through the africa lens, there are concerns and criticisms that the border closures come into force and it

does penalize countries that have been embroiled in the latest various outbreak. they're concerned about what that means for the economies there. we know there can be twin crises, not just the health crisis but also an economic one that can have dire consequences for nations. so it's an interesting message we'll hear today don't forget we've already seen some nations concerned about what sort of measures they have in place the uk is waiting for an update later today around mask wearing what sort of social media will be required. the use of pcr tests around travel and if you've come into contact with this new variant what self-isolation is going to be required and all of this can have ramifications for business activity and for exacerbating the business trends we've witnessed so far that's around demand on one side and supply

chain inflation on the other so it's a huge conversation here, and what visibility companies have as a result because they're waiting for government guidance at this stage. countries across the world are reimposing travel restrictions in an attempt to restrain omicron but it's already been found in several countries. before the new variant emerged europe was already tackling yet another wave of covid cases with several countries reintroducing tighter restrictions or lockdowns. here in the uk, prime minister boris johnson announced new measures after the chief medical officer warned there was a reasonable chance the omicron could bypass vaccines. starting tomorrow, face masks will be compulsory and anyone arriving to the uk must take a pcr test in two

days, as opposed to a lateral flow test. anyone who tests positive for omicron will have to self-isolate for ten days. the country has identified nine cases of the variant with six new cases confirmed in scotland today. the health secretary said the new restrictions are put in place as a preventative measure in case fears over the variant turn out to be warranted. >> given the mutations in the variant there's reason to think it may be, i stress the word may, this variant may turn out to make our vaccines less effective. it may not we just don't know enough. but as a precautionary measure what we are doing, these measures, but also turning to the vaccination program even if this variant turns out -- it's an if -- to make vaccines less effective, it might be a small impact, but the point is that the vaccines are still going to

give you more protection than otherwise and that's why the booster program is so important. >> the netherlands have found 13 cases of omicron amid passengers who arrived from south africa on friday 61 passengers on board tested positive for some form of covid-19 all those who tested positive are isolating in a hotel near the airport. the cases could be, quote, the tip of the iceberg g 7 will meet later today around the new variants it comes amid concerns that the vaccines could be rendered less effective. a number of countries have restricted or banned flights from southern africa as cases continue to rise a spokesperson told cnbc that developed nations should continue vaccination rollouts as well as share vaccines globally. >> we've screamed it as loudly

as we can. vaccine equity isin everybody' interest the message that did not seem to get through with the most wealthy countries is that it's actually even if you're utterly selfish, it's self-interested to get people, the highest risk groups those are the groups you're going to see a lot of virus circling around in you want them vaccinated everywhere, not just your own country. that message was ignored let's hope this variant is a dress rehearsal. let happens hope this was a dress rehearsal. because unless we move on vaccine equity, the virus will be something we're really struggling to get ahead of >> let's get to dr. paul hunt, thank you for joining us, professor. let me ask you about the situation at hand because it still feels as though there's

enormous uncertainty at this stage. how long will it take to have more answers >> i think we're already hearing sufficient to know that this virus is substantially more transmissible than the delta variant. we don't know yet exactly why. whether it's intrinsically more transmissible or more likely that it's less controlled by prior immunity, whether by natural infection or vaccine i think the indications of that came out from the world health organization yesterday when they said there was a high rate of reinfections with this virus, suggesting that it does escape immunity but that doesn't mean to say it's a complete escape with the other coronaviruses you do see this thing happening regularly. and it is very rarely a complete escape particularly it's rarely that you would get a complete escape

to severe disease. so i think it's likely that this virus -- this variant will be less controlled by vaccine but that vaccines will still provide valuable control and particularly in reducing the risk of severe disease especially i think if you have the booster vaccine. >> professor how do we think about life in the uk then? because we ripped off the mask here, anti-inflammatory looks like it used to, you go into a restaurant, nobody is wearing a mask anymore the windows are often closed in some of these venues what happens from here if there's no such thing really as herd immunity with this variant? >> we would never guarantee to have herd immunity with coronaviruses. that just doesn't happen it's not surprising. at some point we will have to live with this virus it will continue to circulate for decades to come. but not cause the severe disease that we've seen in recent

months and this is not the first time that we've had a big coronavirus pandemic the last one was over 100 years ago now, actually, but it is -- it ultimately becomes another cause of the common cold and the issue is how do we get there with the minimum suffering and minimum harm but ultimately we have to live with the new variants that will come along over the coming years. but unfortunately we're not at that point where we could be so p blase, i'm afraiding. >> in challenging winter months it meant lockdowns were required what is necessary at this stage, what sort of restrictions really are sensible at this point >> well, i think the big issue is how severe illness will be with this new variant with omicron. there are signs from south

africa that maybe the illness is less severe than with delta. but we don't know if that's really the case and if -- if it is, why that is happening. maybe it's because it's reinfecting people who have some degree of immunity if it generally is causing a mild disease and if a booster will go a long way to still reduce hospitalizations and deaths, then hopefully we won't actually have to live under restrictions again and it's arguable that even if it is a complete escape the restrictions we lived in back at the beginning of the outbreak, april 2020, probably wouldn't be enough to stop this particular variant spreading. but we will know more about that coming days and weeks.

>> profess er, what about the symptoms here? early reports suggest there may have been a subtle change in what's reported by those falling ill with this variant. we know if we think back to when we were dealing with coronavirus, distinctive symptoms and even with delta variant it was very hard to detect and it was hard to tell the difference between delta and the flu. how does it make it more difficult for medical officials to identify early on this is coronavirus? >> that's absolutely the case. this virus will become one of the causes of the common cold ultimately as it changes it gets more difficult to distinguish based on clinical symptoms the common cold which could be due to other coronaviruses, those due to covid certainly, but once it does become a cause of the common

cold and we don't start seeing the severe disease, then i think we will start to not bother testing for it and reduce testing and you woultimately itl just become part of the range of viruses that we live with. but in -- in monitoring the pandemic, though, it does make it somewhat more difficult, particularly issues like the -- that gets people to record symptoms, gets more and more difficult for that to distinguish between other causes of the cold and that milder covid infections but this is probably -- the mildness is probably not due to changes in the virus, but due to, as developing immunity either through vaccines or prior infection but reduces the risk

of more severe classic symptoms but still allows the early symptoms of cold-like symptoms, which this seems to be coming more common. >> professor thank you for joining us and sharing your expertise with us. professor of medicine, paul hunter if you want to get involved in the conversation, follow us on twitter at "street signs. coming up on the show, oil rebounds after more than a year on speculation that opec plus producers may pause output hikes.

a big surge in bt's stock price today, a bounce of 8.5%, reliance industries is reportedly weighing a bid for the uk tell coms group the report suggesting reliance could make an unsolicited offer or seek to make a stake.

several months ago they were considering what the options should be and now we have this news flow, you can see the stock price responding the last three months still negative down 1.5% and telecom italia, it lost its fourth ceo in six years following a resignation amid continued pressure it comes a week after kkr's $12 billion takeover and euricia which has cut its guidance amid a drop in europe, they now expect an operating profit margin of 5.5% compared to 6.2% previous target. new guidance is made on the assumption that no fresh lockdowns will take place. that's one company talking about what some of the forecasts look

like let's look at oil as crude prices are rebounding, having plunged $10 on friday. the seventh largest single day decline on record. morgan stanley said it expects a tight oil market next year and raised the price forecast. let's get out to dan, so many twists and turns in the story. just walk us through how the oil markets are thinking about all this >> that's right, karen and there is still a long way to go this week as well opec plus is going to be meeting on thursday to discuss their response to this new variant, and they are still discussing it, we've just had more commentary from russia's deputy prime minister in the past 30 minutes. he's signaling opec plus is going to take a caution approach

around the new variant they said there's no need for hasty decisions when opec meets later in the week to discuss output for january and oil prices have risen today on speculation that opec might pause or reduce its output increases in response to the spread of omicron. oil slumped around 10% on friday that led some analysts to say the market move was an overreaction we heard commentary from morgan stanley today saying oil will get back to the 80 usd handle but suggested that opec might increase output at 200 million barrels a day. so that would be a halving of the current plan in place. opec is doing the math on that as we speak. are they going to be meeting and talking throughout the week before the formal meeting on thursday to discuss output policy they'll also weigh the recent

spr release from the united states and others. the big fear in the market is that we still don't know the extent of the possible demand shock and if we're going to see more border closures, for example, or demand destruck tiff lockdowns. that's what they're going to discuss in particular. they have surprised us in the past they do like to keep the opec watchers on their feet so let's see which way they go. as i mentioned, still a lot we need to get through this week before the group can come to a firm decision. w back to you. elsewhere, nuclear talks resume today over hopes of redoing the agreement is slim. it'll be the first round of talks in nearly six months coming up, already strained global supply chain faces issues with the omicron variant we'll discuss that right after

the break.

welcome to "street signs," i'm karen tso and these are your

headlines. the world health organization says the global risk posed by the omicron variant is very high and urges member states to ramp up their vaccination programs. >> let's hope this is a dress rehearsal because unless we move on vaccine equity, the virus will really develop something that we are struggling to get ahead of. european markets bounce back from friday's selloff. wall street also looking to open in the green. pharma stocks jump as the scientific community scrambles to understand the new variant and moderna says it could have a new vaccine ready for early 2022 japan announces plans to close borders to foreigners from tuesday, amid the spread of omicron but a spokesperson tells cnbc the supply chain squeak is easing. >> it still is getting better by better step by step but we need to carefully monitor and make

sure how we have our plan but as an industry also how we can support each other with a partnership is going to be very important. very important markets at the moment as we deal with the variant concerns i want to take you straight to europe where we have seen a bounce back during the course of the morning in contrast to the violent selling on friday we shed 4.75% on the cac, which was one of the best market for november, and it fell sharply friday, not picking up that territory, as you can see. it's a strong move to the upside, but still .9% only representing a fraction of what was lost in the friday trade, same story with the dax, picking up roughly .5% it's a cautious move to the upside, various sectors across the board were particularly hard hit by some of the concerns. and exchange markets as well

don't forget dollar has been king in recent months around this whole story around the interest rate differentials that the u.s. is likely to be one of the first movers around the taper wind down first and then perhaps a pull forward on interest rates but the story did take a twist, of course, on friday and we saw a euro was supported, it's down about a .3%, against the dollar. the dollar is stronger versus the yen. friday was the story around the safe haven trades, including the japanese yen, but that's not the case today dollar weakening versus the chinese currency the futures state side we had a weaker session friday, but it was a short session, it was hard to judge because a lot of people had been expected to step away from the office, enjoy thanksgiving and don't forget it was the first time many got to go back and be with family and

friends on the back of this pandemic so what sort of a trade and how did that express what all the market feels at this stage is the big question but today it does look as though we're on course for a better session, 140 points to the upside for the dow and across the markets, too, what's scignificant is the rotation story we've seen it with the banks, whether some of the pandemic winners, technology, are worth watching again amid the uncertainty we're dealing with and what restrictions will be required. even amid countries where there's reluctance to go back into restrictions and lockdowns. and to communicate with populations that have had vaccines, one veaccine, two, and in some cases the booster as well so it's difficult for politicians to consider right now at this point around the variant. japan will close borders on tuesday to foreigners. the government will respond to

the omicron variant with a strong sense of urgency. this has unveiled a new long-term strategy, the japanese car makers new road map will see it spend $18 billion over the next five years as they look to electrify more of its lineup a quick look at nissan trade, been a rough trading session for a number of the automakers one of the messages is we may see further problems around supply chain, particularly with border closures it does make flights more challenging at this stage and dealing with higher transmission of this variant does it impact some of the factories and therefore what we can expect in terms of pieces of the supply chain, so you can see auto suffering today. that said, the here and now as we talked to nissan's ceo, who said the global semiconductor

shortage was starting to ease. >> it still are getting better by better, step by step, but we need to carefully monitor and how to make sure to have our plan, not only by nissan but also as an industry how we can support each other with the partnership, it's going to be very important and that's what we are doing today >> the emergence of the omicron variant will exacerbate existing strains and global supply chains according to the united nations conference on trade and development. it warned countries to accelerate their vaccination campaigns to avoid these h head headwinds. we're joined by dan hoffman joining us on the back of this news can i just ask you a little bit about what we're expecting, then, because the early take away message is that we were starting to get back to normal on many of these pieces of the puzzle around the supply chain what's your expectation from here >> good morning from geneva.

yes, unfortunately this is bad news on two accounts if we don't get back to normal in the supply chain, it also means that we will continue to have longer waiting times in ports and containers we have some hard data comparing time in port after since covid and pre-covid so the typical time a container ship spends in port globally is 12% longer than before covid typically container door-to-door 20% longer so this means like the supply curve moves to the left the demand, interestingly, also is impacted, again also by the new variant if you want. the longer it takes us to get back to normal, the longer we will not spend money o'hn hair cuts, restaurants, travel,

movies and instead spend money on stuff and where the two meet is high end, that's why we have the record freight rates and delayed congestion so it is bad news, this variant, also for the supply chain. >> how much of this depends on china. we've been talking about them having zero tolerance when it comes to covid for many months but with that approach not changing with new variant how do we consider the impact of china on global supply chains from here >> a lot of the good that we purchase, while we are in lockdown, are made in china. so yes, there's this increased demand but the stoppage and shortage and the volume of capacity that is being held up and that leads to this global shortage is actually largely on the west coast of the united states we have congestion and delays everywhere, but because of the volume of trade that is held up in front of los angeles, it is

there that we have -- depends on how you calculate, but maybe one third globally is where it's wait so that case it's from klchina, but the delays are largely in ports of estination. >> can i ask you about autos, the area of the market we're seeing weakness today. is it right to expect that all the pieces, whether it's the chips or other pasrts of the supply chain that go into autos will be impacted by the latest variant? >> this is one very nice example of the deeper supply chains. even though the cost of moving a g good from say shanghai to los angeles, may not be that high

for high value but because a lot of the bits and pieces that are inside the good, inside the component, you're up to nine steps of deeper supply chain, so in the end we accumulate these higher transport costs and every risk, delay, every missing component that then leads to this accumulated, big impact on high value goods the other goods that are highly impacted are actually very low value goods where the transport cost, the high share of the delivered good price so there are these two types of good most negatively affected by this congestion and the high freight rates. >> can i ask you about the short term, too, because before we were talking about thisvariant we were told to go out and buy christmas presents and anything you wanted for the season early because you may find there will be a shortage or at least a bit of a hassle getting your hands on some of these products, what

happens now, do you see a short term impact from the variant and things about consumers getting products shipped ahead of christmas? >> we should not encourage people now to buy things that we do not really need because that's a vicious cycle you may remember that we all ran out of toilet paper when the pandemic started because everybody thought we would run out of toilet paper. so i don't want to encourage this, but there's a risk you may recall when it was stuck in the canal, all of a sudden one ship, led to a rebound of freight rates and we cannot exclude the possibility that some close down in some chinese ports, some factory, chip maker in east or southeast asia can really have this negative impact for me i want to come back to the point that you made in the introduction that a key message from our research on supply

chains actually boils down to the big picture of the vaccination. why do we get all these variants why do we not get back to normal in our day-to-day life so from the perspective, it's very important that all countries have access to vaccinations to reduce the likelihood of new variants and to reduce the congestion in all ports of the world >> jan, thanks very much for joining us today jan hoffman. i think as many are wondering what the supply chains are going to look like, very valuable messages in that conversation. u.s. futures point to gains after friday's selloff particularly european markets. state side more contained but still deeply in negative territory. what to expect when wall street returns today.

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you're now looking at live pictures from the world health assembly where member states are

meeting today to discuss the pandemic response and preparedness concerns over the new omicron variant is, of course, what we're talking about. countries are on high alert at this stage and we're hearing from the president of the european commission now. let's listen in and see what she has to say. >> to strengthen pandemic prevention, preparedness and response i also support targeted improvements to the 2005 international health regulations an overall strengthening of the w.h.o. so important and the establishment of the new intermediary fund for global health security and pandemic preparedness from our side the european commission looks forward to inclusive multilateral negotiations starting next year. but there can be no stand-still in a pandemic and we still have urgent tasks ahead of us

as we speak, the global communities faced with the threat of a new highly transmissible variant of covid-19, omicron. this is not the first variant, and this time the world showed it is learning and i want to say explicitly that i'm personally grateful to the leadership of president ramapoza for that. south africa's work and transparency sharing the results allowed a swift global response. it no doubt saved many lives and it is a model of how international cooperation should work in the face of cross border health threats because only collective, effective and immediate responses can work against viruses that, of course, do not respect either borders or good intentions

at the global health summit in may, we agreed to uphold the principles of equity and good governance we agreed to make multilateral cooperation and solidarity the only viable way forward. the g-20 summit repeated that pledge last month in roam and you can count on the european union to make good on that the european union and its member states will work very hard to achieve the global vaccination target of 70% in 2022, agreed at the recent g-20 summit and we will support capacity building for sequencing, testing, treatments, and, of course, vaccination. we know we can get there, and we will make sure that we do. and this is why europe's aims at sharing at least 700 million doses of vaccines by mid 2022

with low and middle income countries. it is why we helped create the act accelerator and provided funding for global vaccination and it is also why we are investing heavily in vaccine manufacturing in africa. and we're also engaging on vaccine manufacturing with south america. together, with our partners, we will do everything needed to overcome this pandemic and be better prepared for the future i wish you a successful world health assembly, you have an important work ahead of you, and i very much thank you for your attention. >> ursula von der leyen there, explaining her position and where european stands. there's been criticism in the vaccine rollout in many developing places trying to get us to places we can slow

variants of the vaccine. the aim is to distribute 700 million vaccines by next year. the world health organization was clear even if it's about self-interest and preservation means getting the world vaccinated not just individual countries. let's take you to futures state side showing stronger numbers on the charts, on the upside for most of the morning session and count down suggesting we'll see a reversal of the selling pressure friday friday was disrupted, only a handful of hours to trade the session around the variant news and also with not much information. let's get to karl wineberg another twist in the road here around the pandemic. how are you weighing up the implications at this early stage? >> good morning. it's impossible to weigh out the

economic implications right now. anyone who tells you what's going to happen with the virus is making up a story until we know what happens with the virus we don't know what happens with the economy going into the virus, the u.s. economy was doing really great the latest data show that consumer spending is accelerating, investment is going well, industry is doing okay besides the automobile problem, exports are up. the labor market responding. looking at europe, not so good and the slow down and the rebound, the actual declines in industrial production give that economy a weak basis to go into another round of pandemic. if we have a virus mutation that can resist the vaccines we're going to have lockdowns and go into a global recession. and one of the weak points right now is europe where we were on the verge of a lockdown because

of the delta variant and the infections it was causing even before we got this new mutation. so i'm worried about the outlook but science the going to have to determine the next move not economists. >> there's an effort of whatever it takes to contain the outbreak and manage the impact on health services that's the message all along. what happens here when we talk about paying for any further restrictions that may be required for populations, just how challenging a situation is that as we try to regroup on the back of the last debts, the printing of monetary, what's the impact what's from here >> i think we pretty much spent most of our monetary and fiscal policy on the first round with this so if we go into, say, a 100-day phase during which the vaccine makers have to develop and test a new variant of the vaccines against the new variant of the virus, then, you know, what happens to the economy, what do we do during that period

that implies a social choice, do we go to zero tolerance and lock everybody down do we agree to accept the human cost as we did before, those answers are up to politicians and other people one pay grade higher than myself again, what we learned the last time around is that we can somewhat control the spread of the virus by going to social distancing, by locking down, by working from home as much as we can, but shutting down certain kinds of activities but there is an economist cost to that and i don't know what the right answer is in terms of how to balance out the costs versus the costs >> carl, at this early point as we wait for answers to just how detrimental this variant could be for the health services and what sort of crisis we're looking at, what do you think it means for interest rates before it hit, we were talking about a much faster exit from the fed, with this uncertainty

is it fair to say now we need to park those conversations around a faster taper and liftoff of interest rates >> well, right now, it would be very, very hard for any central banks on the planet to argue withdrawing stimulus is the right course of action given the uncertainty posed by the new virus. i think that all expectations for rate hikes whatever you were expecting you have to push it back until we know the scientific answers related to the new strain those answers could be, it's just another variant and there's nothing that vaccines can't handle in it so therefore we're going to continue as we were and then we can resume the conversations that we had the last time i was on your program, which is do we really have inflation? does that inflation really merit a policy response? is it really worth targeting inflation at this particular

point in what's going on i just remind everyone that the only tool that central banks have to fight inflation is to cause a recession. and one can wonder why any central bank would think that's a good idea right now? >> we spoke with guests about the supply chain issues being exacerbated. but the other question is the labor shortages in the sector. you may see consumers to not go out and mingle as much because they're concerned and those that may have been considered going back into the workforce are concerned. so we could look at a skill shortage for longer. >> the skill shortage in the sector, everywhere in the world right now is a symptom of a rebalancing of our economy when we went into lockdowns and changed the way we do what we do, we changed the composition of our demand for services and we invented new services

in particular click to shop is a very important one, means people are buying stuff by clicking rather than going to stores. means we need fewer people in stores and more people delivering packages. so an interrupter like amazon comes in and handles that. looking at a change in our economy causing shortages. i'm not concerned about it persisting forever it's this question of going through this period of transition. >> thank you for joining us. i think someone is making coffee or juice behind you. thank you for joining us we have an exclusive interview with the eu chief competition commissioner later on at 12:00 thank you for joining us today i'm karen tso. "worldwide exchange" is up next.

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it is 5:00 a.m. in new york city, 12 noon in south africa. here's your top five at 5:00, markets trying to rebound after friday's selloff this as politicians rush to try to slow the spread of the latest covid variant. the u.s., japan and at least a dozen european countries imposing travel restrictions from southern africa other countries halting in bound travel altogether. just as fast as the new variant has been identified, vaccines to fight the mutation could be on the way in a matter of