China’s rockstar-of-tech has fallen foul of Xi

FTSE indices soared as the Biden Bounce met vaccine euphoria, underpinned by the Bank of England’s announcement of another £150 billion injection of quantitative easing. It was heartening to see shares in airlines, hotels and Rolls-Royce, the aero engine maker, perking up — and hardly surprising to see lockdown winners such as Ocado and Just Eat among the fallers. Across the Atlantic, even mighty Amazon shed 5 per cent on Monday.

But stock markets are one thing and real life is another. What matters in the short term is whether Boris Johnson can get us out of the lockdown he clearly didn’t want before the tide of redundancies, heading towards 150,000 a month, crushes the prospects for a consumer-led recovery, even after vaccine distribution has begun.

What matters too, right now and all the more so after Donald Trump is finally dragged from the White House, is that the government does not blunder its way to a final Brexit that not only makes life hell for the many vital British businesses who feel Downing Street doesn’t give a toss about them — but also manages to sour the start of a new era of UK-US relations.

Joe Biden is by all accounts a pragmatist who will depersonalise international relations and order his officials to deal simultaneously with the EU over punitive tariffs (new ones came into effect this week, relating to a long-running fight over subsidies for Airbus and Boeing) and the UK over future trade. So there’s no reason to expect slower negotiations or a worse outcome than we might have had from Trump.