February was an interesting month with vaccine rollout data from the US and the UK particularly positive. This, combined with continued easy monetary and fiscal conditions (including a likely further $1.9bn in stimulus in the US), was enough to ignite optimism around economic recovery enough to cause inflation expectations to rise. Bond yields subsequently rose sharply; there was an 18% rise in the price of oil over the month and there was stronger performance from areas of the market that had been more affected by the virus (smaller companies and ‘cheaper’ value companies).

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