LBLV provides an overview of economic news.

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The main economic news for Tuesday, March 16:

0:00 Volkswagen set to profit on cost cuts and EV plans
1:06 Global stocks follow US gains ahead of Fed speech
2:11 EU countries suspend use of AstraZeneca vaccine
3:05 Oil continues to fall due to rising US inventories

1. Volkswagen set to profit on cost cuts and EV plans
Volkswagen is confident that cost-cutting will help it improve profitability in the coming years. The company said this on Tuesday, a day after revealing an ambitious expansion of electric cars. The world's second-largest automaker plans to more than double deliveries of electric cars to 1 million this year, build a half-dozen battery plants in Europe and expand electric vehicle charging infrastructure around the world, accelerating efforts to overtake Tesla. Volkswagen said it going to achieve operating margins of 7%-8% in the years after 2021, confirming that the end of 2021 will likely come at the top end of the 5%-6.5% target corridor. This will be achieved by 2 billion euros less fixed costs by 2023 compared with 2020, a 5% reduction, and a 7% reduction in material costs over the same period, according to the company officials.

2. Global stocks follow US gains ahead of Fed speech
Asian stocks rose Tuesday, following Wall Street's advance to record highs, as investors expected a meeting of the U.S. Federal Reserve and other central banks this week to keep accommodative policies in place to help the global economy recover from the pandemic. Moreover, long-term U.S. Treasury yields fell even further. The Asia-Pacific equity markets index excluding Japan gained 0.69%, with Australia's benchmark S&P/ASX 200 index jumping 1.2%. Japan's Nikkei 225 was up 0.5%. Meanwhile, European markets opened mixed after a positive report from the U.S., but a more subdued tone from Germany, which stopped AstraZeneca's vaccine. On Monday, the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average soared as travel stocks surged as mass vaccinations in the U.S. and Congress' approval of a $1.9 trillion bailout bill fueled investor optimism. The Dow gained 0.53%, the S&P 500 rose 0.65%, and the Nasdaq remained flat.

3. EU countries suspend use of AstraZeneca vaccine
Germany, France and Italy said Monday they would suspend use of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine after several countries reported possible serious side effects. However, the World Health Organization (WHO) said the link between the vaccine and complications has not been proven and there is no reason to panic. The head of the WHO announced a meeting of the AstraZeneca advisory committee on Tuesday. The regulator is going to evaluate the information gathered about thromboembolic complications in vaccinated people. Nevertheless, the decision by the three largest EU countries to suspend the use of AstraZeneca's vaccine has worsened the already difficult immunization situation in the region. The Netherlands suspended public vaccination on Sunday following earlier reports in Ireland, Iceland, Denmark and Norway. Some countries have only refused certain batches of doses, but not refused them altogether.

4. Oil continues to fall due to rising US inventories
Oil prices declined on Tuesday for the third session in a row due to concerns about rising inventories in the U.S. and demand from European countries, which slowed down the immunization process. Brent crude futures were down 0.83% to $68.31 a barrel and WTI crude fell 0.89% to $64.81 a barrel. Fuel inventories in the United States are also rising because of last month's abnormal freeze, which halted oil refining and took some time to fully return to previous volumes. Oil reserves approached 500 million barrels. The American Petroleum Institute (API) will release its own data on U.S. fuel inventories later Tuesday; official data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA) will be released Wednesday.