That’s according to Paul Christopher, head of global market strategy for Wells Fargo Investment Institute. We’re already seeing better-than-expected results for many companies with strong growth outlooks for 2021. “Earnings are going higher, and the consensus seems to be concentrating around a significant increase over what we had in 2020, even, in some cases, above 2019 earnings,” Christopher said. “That’s what’s going to drive stocks here. The rest of it, recovery and inflation from very depressed levels up to around 2%, 2.5%, is not unusual for a recovery, and the Fed would actually like to see that.”