The S&P 500 quietly ended the wild year at 4766, registering an annual increase of 26.9%, and posting 70 new record highs for 2021, the second most in history, having notched 78 in 1995. Dealogic data showed global M&A volumes reached $5.8 trillion, handsomely beating the previous record of $4.6 trillion in 2007. Meanwhile, four million Reddit day traders took on the hedge-funds, disrupting the “white shoes” experts of Wall Street and outplaying them at their own game by sparking short squeezes. Indeed, retail investors have proven themselves capable of mounting many successful “value captures” at the expense of large institutional investors. As the curtain closed, the collective net worth of the world’s richest 10 people rose by almost $400 billion over the course of 2021 for a combined worth of $1.5 trillion. In Canadian terms that comes to $1.9 trillion–75% of the Canadian GDP in current dollars.
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By Hubert Marleau
By Hubert Marleau