🔥 TWO MAGIC WORDS

Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell (aka Jay Power, the Jay-man, the Silver Fed Fox) has some Marvel-level superpowers.

With just two words, he can start a fire on Wall Street.

Asked today whether it’s time for the Fed to wind down its bond purchases he replied: “Not yet.”

And boom goes the dynamite 💥

The Dow was up 200 points and closed above 33,000 for the first time ever. The S&P 500 also hit a fresh high, and the Nasdaq, which had been down moments earlier, zoomed into the green — up 0.4%.

SOME BACKGROUND

Way back at the start of the pandemic, the Fed intervened in financial markets to prevent a meltdown. It started buying hundreds of billions of dollars’ worth of US Treasuries — keeping yields lower, debt cheaper and corporate profits higher. Cha-ching!

Wall Street breathed a sigh of relief today as the Fed announced it would leave interest rates unchanged, near zero, likely until next year. Keeping that easy-money policy in place means the stock market party can keep raging.

A NEW BOGEYMAN

But the Fed also said it was prepared to "adjust the stance of monetary policy as appropriate if risks emerge."

One of these risks could be a spike in inflation — which has emerged as the No. 1 concern among investors polled by Bank of America. Yes, even more of a concern than Covid.

The worry goes like this: If consumer prices spike, the Fed may be forced to raise rates sooner. That would push bond yields up, potentially sparking a so-called taper tantrum — in other words, markets would wig out, to use a technical term.

📦 QUOTE OF THE DAY

My workday feels like a nine-hour intense workout every day. And they track our every move…

— Jennifer Bates, Amazon warehouse employee

Testifying before the Senate Budget Committee, Jennifer Bates described grueling working conditions at her Amazon warehouse that led her and some of her peers to organize the union vote. "Amazon brags it pays workers above the minimum wage. What they don't tell you is what those jobs are really like," she said.

🛠️ MEET ‘ANGI’

Remember Angie’s List? Long before Task Rabbit, Handy or Yelp, in those wild early days of the internet, Angie’s List was one of the go-to sites for rating and reviewing contractors and other services.

More than two decades later, Angie is retiring and “Angi” is taking over.

The company's owner is overhauling the brand, changing its name from ANGI Homeservices to simply Angi Inc. (Its ticker symbol will remain "ANGI.”) The name change is meant to indicate that the company owns other housing-related services and isn't just a list.

BIG PICTURE

Shares of Angi are up nearly 25% this year and have soared about 250% in the past 12 months. That makes it the latest of a growing number of companies that are thriving after being spun off by Barry Diller's media and e-commerce conglomerate IAC. Others on that list include Tinder owner Match, LendingTree, Expedia and TripAdvisor. Next up on IAC’s list? Vimeo.

CNN Business’ Paul R. La Monica has the details.

🎠 SILVER LININGS

Disneyland in California finally set a date to reopen: April 30. Right around the time President Biden has promised that every adult in America will be eligible for a vaccine.

The story of the next few months will be similar: Things are coming back. Disneyland. Restaurants. Travel. Jobs (not enough, and too slowly, but they are coming.)

A year ago, we were making lists of all the things we’d do in lockdown. Bake bread. Marie Kondo our closets. Finally learn Russian. Take up the cello.

And after doing exactly none of those things, we’re now talking about all the things we’ll do when we’re double-vaxxed. Go to Disneyland, perhaps. Take a vacation! (For my part, the minute that second needle leaves my arm I’m gonna lick a New York City subway pole and march into a crowded dive bar with a surly bartender whom I will massively over-tip because I’ll be just that happy.)

Some of this is already happening. My colleagues at CNN have been documenting tearful reunions between vaccinated grandparents and their grandchildren. (And fair warning you'll want tissues around for that video.)

It won’t always be a smooth recovery. Tomorrow, for example, the Labor Department is expected to report that 700,000 people filed for first-time unemployment benefits. That is awful, of course, but it would also be the lowest number of weekly claims since the pandemic started. After the year we've been through, I'm clinging to whatever signs of progress I can get my paws on.

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON?

🗓️The IRS plans to delay this year's tax filing deadline to mid-May.

🏦Amalgamated Bank just became the first major financial institution to endorse reparations for Black Americans.

🚫Topps, the trading card and collectibles company, apologized after it shared an insensitive image of K-pop band BTS bruised and beaten.

💻The “I'm a Mac" actor Justin Long defected to Intel — he’s now a PC.