At the beginning of last year we warned our clients that 2018 was likely to see heightened volatility, particularly in equity markets. And we were right. After a choppy start, the S&P 500 had risen almost 10% by late September, only to fall sharply through Q4 as fears of a global trade war began to mount. By late December, the US benchmark was down more than 20% on its autumn peak. With developed economy equities around 40% overvalued in our judgement, is the bubble about to burst? Probably not. We expect US growth to remain comfortably above trend through 2019.

Two behemoth retailers are beginning to morph. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is changing the e-commerce company by selling shelf space, opening stores and launching catalogs. Old-school rival Walmart, meanwhile, has refreshed Sam Walton’s model with recent online acquisitions like Jet.com. The market is bound to pick up on the similarities. Amazon’s growth, while enviable, is slowing. Wall Street expects revenue to increase about 20 percent in 2019, down from over 30 percent the previous two years, according to Refinitiv data. That’s because there are fewer new markets to create or consumers to win over. The threat of looming regulation of

The world’s richest have long been prepared for the worst, be it financial meltdown, long-term power outages, cyber attacks or pandemic flu. Silicon Valley entrepreneur Sam Altman has an arrangement with billionaire investor Peter Thiel to take a private plane to New Zealand in the event of a systemic collapse, the New Yorker has reported. The general public can’t join these plutocratic “preppers” in their bunker, but they can still align their stock portfolios in anticipation. Breakingviews suggests some ways to turn anxiety over the end of days into investment alpha. Kimberly Clark Toilet paper, toothpaste and diapers will become

David Solomon is like the owner of a Ferrari who hasn’t been given the keys. The new Goldman Sachs boss starts 2019 with one of Wall Street’s most prestigious jobs, and something to prove. This could be the first year in over a decade that the $63 billion bank starts with a smaller market capitalization than its chief rival, Morgan Stanley. Goldman set out in 2017 to create $5 billion of new revenue streams, and Solomon starts with half that figure already in the bag. But there’s a lot to play for. Morgan Stanley boss James Gorman runs a bank

If Facebook can negotiate a difficult year ahead, it may be on its way to becoming Silicon Valley’s version of JPMorgan. A decade ago, financial firms were taking a whipping from politicians, just as tech companies are today. As Jamie Dimon’s bank shows, those who survive the process can end up even stronger. Mark Zuckerberg’s social network faces a world of pain from Washington in 2019. A new Democratic majority in the U.S. House of Representatives has tougher privacy rules on its agenda. Several Democrats want to see those modeled after Europe’s new data protection law, known as GDPR. Facebook’s