Latest from BCA Research

Special Report

In this report, we elaborate on why the Chinese central government has been reluctant to open stimulus taps as much as in the past, especially when it comes to the ailing property market. In recent years, there has been a major shift in Beijing’s assessment of the trade-offs between short-term economic growth, sociopolitical stability and the nation's long-term goals. We explain this difficult balancing act, little-known in the global investment community.

US equity markets had a lackluster September but saw some signs of recovering on the back of “bad news”, i.e., a cooling down of the economy. In the fallout, the USHQ portfolio sustained relative gains vs the SPY (-5.4% vs -7.1%). Information Technology and Consumer Discretionary were the main source of relative outperformance. The BCA Score was the most profitable on a long/short basis over the past month, propelled by its high weighting toward Safety-type factors.

The Fed says that to get back to 2 percent inflation, the US unemployment rate must increase by ‘just’ 0.6 percent through 2023-24. All well and good you might think, except that the Fed is forecasting something that has been unachievable for at least 75 years! Is the Fed gaslighting us? And what does it mean for investment strategy?

Russia’s conflict with the West will escalate and trigger more bad news for risky assets this fall. Beyond that, stalemate looms. Latin American equities present a potential opportunity once the macro and geopolitical backdrop improve.

The MacroQuant Global Equity and Bond scores increased month-over-month. However, the Equity Score remains at a low level, keeping the sector model tilted toward defensives and Energy vs cyclical sectors. The IT Score also moved from bearish to neutral. This past month, our style indicator transitioned to an overweight Growth stance after a long stay in Value.

As our clients know, we have a bearish long-term view on equities. However, we are well aware of the profitable opportunities that swift and furious bear market rallies present to nimble investors. In this short daily note, we will start by summarizing our long-term views on the market, followed by a discussion of why, in all likelihood, we are at the beginning of the next bear market rally. We will also offer a few ideas of how investors can profit from it.

This week, we present our quarterly review of the BCA Research Global Fixed Income Strategy (GFIS) model bond portfolio for Q3/2022. We also discuss the model portfolio’s expected performance over next 3-6 months after our recent moves to reduce overall duration exposure and increase the underweight to US Treasuries.

MacroQuant is overweight bonds, underweight equities, and neutral on cash. Within the equity universe, the model is overweight Japan, the US, and the UK, underweight the Euro Area countries and China, and neutral the remaining countries. The sector model favors defensives and Energy over cyclical sectors.

This week we present our Portfolio Allocation Summary for October 2022.

We remain bearish on equities. Inflation is a monetary phenomenon that is embedded and perpetuated by a wage-price spiral. The Fed will “keep at it until the job is done.” Economic growth is slowing, and an earnings recession as soon as the end of this year is highly likely. US equities are not cheap and rising rates and slowing earnings growth will take their toll on performance. Don’t fight the Fed!