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All hopes for next year - everything from stock market returns to restaurant bookings - are bound up with the view that vaccines will gradually restore normality to a pandemic-ravaged world.

One trade is gripping markets in the early days of 2021: reflation - nowhere more evident than in bonds, where U.S. 10-year Treasury yields topped 1% on Georgia's Senate runoff results.

In just a week, the 'Reddit crowd' trade which squeezed out seasoned hedge funds from GameStop has gone global.

In just a week, the 'Reddit crowd' trade which squeezed out seasoned hedge funds from GameStop has gone global.

It is the end of January, so time for the Davos World Economic Forum (WEF), and Chinese President Xi Jinping, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga and European Central Bank chief Christine Lagarde are among this year's big-name speakers.

One trade is gripping markets in the early days of 2021: reflation - nowhere more evident than in bonds, where U.S. 10-year Treasury yields topped 1% on Georgia's Senate runoff results.

All hopes for next year - everything from stock market returns to restaurant bookings - are bound up with the view that vaccines will gradually restore normality to a pandemic-ravaged world.

An EU official likened the current state of Brexit negotiations to a marathon where runners are "past kilometre 40" of the just over 42-km race. But four weeks before the transition period expires, a no-deal outcome is clearly a risk.

It has been a year many would prefer to forget and a month of 2020 still remains -- one replete with events that could trip up markets. Here they are:

Britain and the European Union are said to be on the verge of clinching a post-Brexit trade deal that would regulate their relationship after the transition period ends on Jan. 1, 2021 -- six weeks away.