Developed Countries
As expected, the Fed downshifted the pace of rate hikes once again and delivered a 25bp rate increase at its Wednesday meeting. Changes to the post-meeting press release support the decision to shift to a less hawkish stance. In particular, the…
President Biden’s political capital has fallen as he enters a challenging year that will include a domestic faceoff with the House Republicans and foreign crises stemming from China, Russia, and Iran. Stay defensive and prefer bonds over equities.
When does rising unemployment become a bigger problem than inflation? The Fed won't cut rates until that happens, probably thwarting market hopes of big cuts in 2H.
The Web 2.0 bubble is bursting, with far-reaching consequences for US stock market behaviour, sector allocation, and global asset allocation.
The Employment Cost Index decelerated to a lower-than-expected 1.0% q/q in Q4 following 1.2%, corroborating several other indicators suggesting that wage growth is moderating in the US. Compensation within goods-producing industries grew at a constant 0.9%…
The preliminary GDP estimate suggests that the Euro Area economy expanded by 0.1% q/q in Q4 2022, beating expectations of a 0.1% q/q contraction. The improving energy situation due to milder-than-anticipated weather, as well as generous fiscal support…
Bonds started off the new year with a bang. So far in 2023, the Barclays US and Global Aggregate indices have returned 2.7% and 3.3%, respectively. These gains come after last year’s historic broad-based bond market selloff when the global monetary policy…
According to BCA Research’s US Bond Strategy service, US Treasuries have limited downside, even in relatively optimistic economic scenarios, but considerable upside in a recessionary scenario. They devise three plausible scenarios for how the US economy could…
Preliminary estimates suggest that Spanish headline harmonized CPI inflation (HICP) accelerated to 5.8% y/y in January, from 5.5% y/y, largely surpassing expectations for a moderation to 4.8% y/y. A reacceleration of fuel prices compared to January 2022, as…
UK stocks have been underperforming their Eurozone peers recently. The MSCI Euro Area index’s 39% gain in the four months since its trough dwarfs the UK benchmark’s 27% increase since its September 27 bottom. Notably, this comes after a period of comparative…