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New figures have revealed that the US is now leading the EU as a destination for UK financial services exports. The UK remains a significant global center for financial and related professional services but relationships and trade links have shifted since the UK left the EU. In 2020, financial services exports from the UK to the EU were down 6.6% to £24.7 billion year-on-year. However, while this trade link between the UK and the EU seems to be reducing in intensity, that's not the case with the connection to the US.

A combination of Chinese regulation and business slowdown has created a distinct retreat of Chinese firms from the Stock Market. In order to find replacements for the now-departed firms, US stock exchanges are looking to locations such as India and south-east Asia. This is a new development, particularly as Asian businesses that aren't based in China haven't featured much in US stock exchanges in recent years. As the loss of revenue from Chinese firms that have left the stock markets starts to cause issues for the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq, there have been new attempts to attract listings from other Asian countries.

The impact that the new Omicron variant of coronavirus could have on energy demand has been a hot topic in recent times. It has been something that has been particularly influential with respect to oil output policy, especially given the shaky impact that the new variant has been having on the market in recent weeks. Increased price volatility, as well as the potential that the new variant has to negatively affect demand, are two key factors when it comes to what comes next for the oil industry.

The labor market in the US has gone through some seismic shifts over the past year or so and new patterns are emerging in terms of the way that we engage with work today. In particular, we are beginning to see a new working generation focused on leveraging the power that they have in the labor market to continually move on to bigger and better things.

Prospects are looking bright for the insurance sector in 2022 - at least according to Deloitte's 2022 insurance industry outlook. Despite the fact that this year has been a tricky one for many insurance businesses, two-thirds of the respondents to the Deloitte survey said that they felt that revenues would be "significantly better" next year.

Despite the fact that the Omicron variant has been dominating the headlines and triggering a vast amount of speculation about the negative impact this could potentially have on markets, there are also signs that December could be a great month for stocks. November and December have traditionally been the S&P 500's second-and-third-best months of the year since 1950 and history may indicate that December could end up being especially strong.

The most recent fixed income outlook from Goldman Sachs asset management has identified an ongoing situation of changing landscapes and challenges as the pandemic continues to evolve. However, it's not just COVID-19 that is having an impact on the way that the market is changing but also other factors including logistical problems and changing demand dynamics. Financial conditions have eased somewhat since 2020 and there is a positive impulse from fiscal spending as well as global activity that is expansionary.

October was a pretty impressive month for cryptocurrencies - the most well-known of all, Bitcoin, enjoyed a 40% spike and many others also pushed up to reach an all-time high. The Shiba Inu coin, for example, gained more than 800% during the month. Shiba Inu coin was created as a spin-off from the Dogecoin but overtook the original by a long way thanks to October's incredible activity. There's no doubt that Bitcoin changed the financial world forever when it was invented in 2009 and it now has the potential to dominate the balance sheets of corporate America too.

Insuretch is a burgeoning industry across the world and the US sector enjoyed a positive wave of funding in the third quarter of 2021. According to a recent report from Forrester Research Inc, global insurtech funding reached $53 billion in the third quarter of this year. This is in comparison to the same time period the year before where only $1.87 billion of insurtech funding was recorded. Of this increased amount, 70% was received by US insurtechs with the largest volume of funding being channeled into early-stage start-ups. In terms of Q4, the outlook remains strong and the forecast is bullish for the rest of the year.

Elon Musk has become a big figure on Twitter since he joined but using the social media platform to make investment decisions is not something anyone anticipated he would do. Nevertheless, Musk recently launched a Twitter poll that appeared to give Twitter users the chance to decide whether or not he would sell a large chunk of Tesla shares. However, it has now emerged that Elon Musk had actually already committed to selling many of his shares in the company weeks before he even mentioned it on social media. According to an SEC filing, Musk had actually committed to selling at least $1 billion of shares in Tesla in September.