This is a year in financial markets that will be remembered. Stocks had their worst start to a year since the Great Depression and quickly entered a bear market. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies plunged by more than 60%. The Federal Reserve delivered the biggest interest-rate hike in decades. Oil prices surged past $100 a barrel, and yields on government bonds soared. All that has happened before the Fourth of July fireworks.
In this monumental year for markets, MarketWatch wants to know, who are the people influencing markets the most? Our newsroom has started working to figure this out, and we are turning to our readers for help. We plan to publish a list of the 50 most influential people in markets, the MarketWatch 50, this fall.
MarketWatch is seeking nominations, suggestions and ideas from our readers for the MarketWatch 50. We cherish our readers and want to know what they think. Who are the traders, investors, policy makers, government officials, CEOs and influencers who are impacting markets the most in 2022? Please submit your nominations here.
We aim to come up with a list that is as broad and diverse as the market itself. The MarketWatch 50 will be made up of people whose actions, work and opinions have impacted markets. These are the people who help move the prices of securities, commodities or currencies; influence the behavior and strategies of market participants; and play a role in determining how markets are structured, regulated and function.
Who are the traders, investors, policymakers, government officials, CEOs and influencers who are impacting markets the most in 2022?
Some of the bigger names in markets this year are obvious. In 2022, Elon Musk has launched a pending $44 billion deal for Twitter
TWTR,
kept working in his special way to transform the automobile industry at Tesla
TSLA,
and spacecraft at SpaceX, and continued to back a cryptocurrency started as a joke in Dogecoin
DOGEUSD,
Jerome Powell has led the Federal Reserve in a year when it pivoted from pumping liquidity into the market to enacting a huge interest-rate hike within a span of weeks.
But some market influencers are less obvious. They don’t necessarily need to head large institutions. How about Keith Gill? Known to his followers as Roaring Kitty, the day trader helped launch the so-called meme-stock craze with Reddit posts detailing his GameStop positions, contributing to an epic short squeeze that hit large hedge funds. Gill would have been an excellent MarketWatch 50 candidate in 2021, but this year he has been silent and doesn’t seem to have had any impact at all, and the meme frenzy itself has faded. Are there other people influencing market behavior in 2022 through social-media posts?
Here’s how this will work. MarketWatch’s newsroom will collect and review the nominations. Our editorial team will read each submission — every single one — and we will circulate the strong and interesting candidates among our staff for consideration. There is room in the nomination form to tell us why you think a specific candidate is having an outsized influence on markets this year.
MarketWatch’s reporters will also scour their beats, talk to their sources and work to follow-up on promising submissions. In the end, a list-selection committee comprising MarketWatch’s group editors and the editor in chief will determine the final list.
We are giving you the summer to think about this. Submissions are due by Sept. 1. MarketWatch looks forward to hearing from you.
