Currencies

Highlights So far, both the demand and supply side of the Philippine economy have been rather weak; yet there are signs that growth is set to revive. Fiscal expenditures have bottomed. Bank lending is also reviving. Acceleration in broad money supply is usually a good omen for stronger economic activity (Chart 1). Being a defensive market within EM, Philippine stocks will benefit in an impending period of weak EM stock prices. Upgrade this bourse from underweight to neutral in an EM equity portfolio. Philippine sovereign credit is also defensive in nature relative to its EM peers. Stay overweight in an EM portfolio. A deteriorating external accounts outlook makes the peso vulnerable. The central bank will also likely tolerate a weaker currency. Stay short the peso versus the US dollar. A vulnerable peso renders Philippine domestic bonds unappealing. Stay neutral in an EM domestic bonds portfolio. Feature The steep underperformance of Philippine stocks over the past several years is due for a pause. While this bourse may not see a sustainable rally in absolute terms, a period of flattish relative performance vis-à-vis the EM benchmark is likely. We recommend upgrading this market from underweight to neutral within an EM equity portfolio (Chart 2). Chart 1Accelerating Fiscal Spending And Credit Is A Good Omen For Economic Growth Chart 2Philippine Stocks' Underperformance Is Set For A Breather But It's A Risk In Absolute Terms One reason why Philippine stocks are unlikely to rally in absolute US dollar terms is a vulnerable peso. Philippine external accounts will likely deteriorate further, and therefore the peso is set to continue to trade on the weaker side. Currency investors should stick with our recommended short the peso versus US dollar trade for now. Philippine domestic bonds also remain unattractive to foreign investors. Local bond yields are not high enough relative to those of safe-haven bonds (US treasuries). As a result, the country is witnessing net debt portfolio outflows. The nation’s sovereign USD bonds, however, will likely outperform the EM benchmark going forward and merit an overweight stance in an EM sovereign bond portfolio. A Feeble Economy …   The Philippine economy, so far, continues to be soft. Demand has been sluggish: manufacturing sales remain well below pre-pandemic levels – both in value and volume terms. So are car sales (Chart 3). On the supply side, production volume gives a similar message: they are still below pre-pandemic levels. Manufacturing PMI is barely in the expansion territory (Chart 4). In other words, there is palpable weakness in both the demand and supply side of the domestic economy. Chart 3The Demand Side Of The Economy Has Been Weak... Chart 4...So Has Been The Supply Side The soft domestic demand is also evident from the import cargo throughput in the country’s ports. While exports cargo has risen well above pre-pandemic levels, import cargo has not (Chart 5). Part of the reason behind the lingering frailty is muted fiscal spending. Over the past 12 months, the latter has decelerated measurably. To be sure, Philippine fiscal outlays during the entire pandemic period have not been extraordinary; and yet this has slowed further (Chart 6, top panel). Chart 5Weak Domestic Demand Is Also Evident In Still Subdued Imports Chart 6Govt Spending Had Decelerated, Even As QE Proceeds Remained Unspent   The sharp widening seen in the country’s fiscal deficits had more to do with dwindling fiscal revenues, rather than strong spending. In fact, central bank data shows that most of its government bond purchase proceeds (‘QE’ proceeds) are unspent – still sitting in the government’s accounts with the central bank, i.e., they have not been channeled into the economy (Chart 6, bottom panel). … But Plenty Of Dry Powder Going forward, however, that picture is likely to change. The country is heading into general elections in May 2022. Lawmakers therefore have an incentive to spend the amount currently lying in the central bank. The amelioration in the number of new Covid-19 cases has enabled a re-opening of the economy, which will make stimulus spending easier. In addition, the federal budget for 2022 passed last month1 includes an 11.5% hike in government outlays. With core CPI at 3%, this translates into a robust 8.5% government expenditure growth rate in real terms. Chart 7Credit Is Finally Reviving Beyond fiscal spending, the country’s bank credit might also gain some traction: During the pandemic, banks shunned loan disbursements. Lately, however, there are signs that credit is reviving (Chart 7). Real borrowing costs (prime lending rates deflated by core CPI) from banks are low, close to only 1%. Such low cost of credit should encourage new borrowing at a time when economic activity is resuming. On their part, banks have made sizeable provisions against the rising NPLs during the pandemic, and therefore have already taken a substantial hit on their books (Chart 8, top panel). Relatively cleaner balance sheets should encourage banks to lend. Banks have also been able to materially raise their operating efficiency in the past couple of years (by way of rising net interest income). As a result, operating margins have improved measurably. This has helped absorb part of the NPL-related losses and has somewhat cushioned the blow to banks’ bottom line (Chart 8, bottom panel). Relatively better margins (than otherwise would have been the case) should prompt banks to take relatively higher risks, i.e., expand their loan books going forward. Should fiscal authorities ramp up their spending, and should banks also begin to lend again, the activity that has resumed following a lessening of Covid-19 cases will get a fillip. Higher fiscal spending and bank credit will lift money supply in the economy, usually a good omen for stronger economic activity (see Chart 1 on page 1). Incidentally, inflation in the Philippines is under control. The relatively high headline inflation print is not indicative of any genuine inflationary pressures, and is due mostly to food prices, which account for 38% of the CPI basket. Core and trimmed mean CPI are much lower at around 3% (Chart 9, top panel). Chart 8Banks Have Cleaner Books Now As They Made Sizable NPL Provisions Chart 9There Are No Genuine Inflationary Pressures In The Philippines The central bank expects the headline inflation rate to decelerate to within its target band of 2% to 4% by the end of this year and settle close to the midpoint in 2022 and 2023. At the same time, Philippine nominal wages are barely growing (Chart 9, bottom panel). This implies that businesses have little margin pressures to raise their selling prices. Genuine inflationary pressures, therefore, are unlikely to become acute in the foreseeable future. That, in turn, will help keep fiscal and monetary policies accommodative.  Domestic Bond Yields Will Stay Flattish With the resumption of economic activity, will come higher fiscal revenues. That should help the Philippine fiscal deficit to narrow.  Narrower fiscal deficit in the Philippines is usually bond bullish (i.e., bond yields go down). Yet, lower bond yields will have negative implications for Philippine capital inflows. Foreign investors are the marginal buyers of Philippine bonds. And their appetite for the latter depends on how much extra yield the Philippines offers over safe-haven bonds (US treasuries). Chart 10 shows that whenever the yield differential narrows too much (to around 200 basis points), net debt portfolio inflows into the Philippines typically stop, and often turn into outflows. This is what is happening now. On the other end, when the differential widens enough (about 400 - 500 basis points), those outflows turn into inflows again. Chart 10The Philippines Need To Offer Relatively Higher Yields To Attract Capital Inflows Given that we expect US long-term bond yields to rise, if Philippine bond yields do not rise at an even faster pace, its yield differential would stay low. Thus, the country will be hard-pressed to see any debt portfolio inflows in the near future. The absence of foreign buyers, in turn, would put a floor under bond yields. This will counterbalance any yield-suppressing forces coming from improving fiscal deficits. Thus, overall, the country will likely see flattish yields over the next six to nine months. And The Peso, Shaky Chart 11Debt Dominates The Philippines' Capital Inflows Low bond yields and short-term interest rates will have negative ramifications for the currency: It’s the foreign debt flows, rather than equity investments, that dominate Philippine capital inflows. This is true for all categories of inflows: FDI, portfolio and other investments (Chart 11). The fact that debt investors are the dominant group among foreign investors has some implications. Debt investors do not like lower interest rates while equity investors do. As such, debt inflows into the Philippines diminish when the interest rates (bond yields) are relatively low. Muted foreign capital inflows, in turn, are bearish for the peso. The country’s current account outlook is also not rosy. The trade deficit has widened significantly, and the robust current account surplus has given way to deficits – in line with our forecast in our previous report. With domestic demand reviving (government spending, household consumption and business investment), imports will now likely grow faster than exports, and therefore, will weigh down on both trade and current account deficits further in the months ahead. Notably, the country’s overseas workers’ remittances have also rolled over in recent months. All these will be a headwind for the peso (Chart 12). As noted, the central bank does not expect inflation to overshoot their target in the next two years. They have also been a net buyer of US dollars year-to-date, i.e., they have been leaning against their currency. This implies that they would not mind a weaker currency – especially when the economy is still not strong, and inflation is not a threat. Incidentally, the peso is also about 7% expensive vis-à-vis the US dollar in purchasing power terms (Chart 13). Chart 12Current Account Balance Will Deteriorate As Rising Domestic Demand Fuels Imports Chart 13The Peso Is Somewhat Expensive In PPP Terms And Is Vulnerable To A Downside Equity Underperformance Is Late An improving fiscal balance is usually bullish news for Philippine stock multiples. The connection is via bond yields/interest rates. An improving fiscal balance leads to lower bond yields, which, in turn, boost this market which is dominated by interest rate sensitive sectors (real estate, financials/banks and utilities make up 50% of market cap). Chart 14Weak EM Stock Prices Herald Outperformance by The Defensive Philippine Markets Yet, in this cycle, an improving fiscal balance may not herald a material fall in the country’s bond yields due to net debt portfolio outflows (as explained above). Thus, Philippine stocks would miss the tailwind from rising multiples. A dim outlook for the peso also calls for caution on the part of absolute-return foreign investors. That said, the resumption of economic activity will lead to rising earnings, and that should provide some tailwinds for this market. Moreover, as a defensive market within EM, Philippine stocks usually outperform the overall EM benchmark during periods of weak EM stock prices. Incidentally, we have a negative outlook on EM stock prices over the coming several months (Chart 14). Weighing all the pros and cons, we infer that Philippine stocks’ relative performance will likely be rangebound over the next six to nine months. Sovereign Credit Will Outperform Chart 15The Philippines' Sovereign Credit Outperforms During EM Risk-Off Periods, Stay Overweight A negative outlook on overall EM sovereign credit warrants overweighting Philippine sovereign credit relative to its EM brethren. The reason is the defensive nature of the Philippine sovereign bond market – just like its equity market. During periods of stress, Philippine sovereign spreads widen much less than its EM peers. Chart 15 shows that in each of the last three risk-off periods (2008-09, 2015, 2020), Philippine sovereign credit massively outperformed the EM benchmark. The basis for the defensive features of Philippine sovereign credit is that the nation’s external public debt is quite low at 18% of GDP, down from 25% ten years back. Of this, foreign bonds outstanding are 10% of GDP, down from 12% ten years back (the rest being loans and contingent liabilities). Such low debt means the defensive nature of this market is unlikely to change soon. Hence, it makes sense to overweight Philippine sovereign bonds in view of impending sovereign credit spreads widening in the broader EM universe. Investment Conclusions Stocks: The Philippine economy will likely see some traction in the months ahead as fiscal spending rises and bank credit revives. This bourse’s relative performance will also benefit in an impending risk-off period in emerging markets. Asset allocators should upgrade this market from underweight to neutral in an EM equity portfolio. Our underweight call on this market vis-à-vis an EM equity portfolio has yielded a gain of 16% since we recommended it in October 2018. The Peso: The peso remains vulnerable in the face of deteriorating external accounts. Currency investors should stay with our recommended long USD/ short PHP trade for now. This call has yielded 2.1% so far since our recommendation on March 18, 2021. Chart 16Philippine Domestic Bonds Warrants A Neutral Allocation In An EM Portfolio Domestic Bonds: Local currency bond yields in the Philippines are likely to stay flattish despite the slated improvements in the country’s fiscal balance. The peso is also set to stay weak. These call for a cautious stance on Philippine domestic bonds. Yet, they tend to do well relative to their EM counterparts during periods of EM stress – as they did in 2015 and in 2020 (Chart 16). Since another such period is around the corner, we recommend that investors maintain a neutral allocation of Philippine local currency bonds in an EM portfolio.    Sovereign Bonds: Philippine sovereign bonds are set to outperform their EM counterparts. Asset allocators should stay overweight the Philippines in a dedicated EM sovereign bonds portfolio. Rajeeb Pramanik Senior EM Strategist rajeeb.pramanik@bcaresearch.com   Footnotes 1 Passed in the third and final reading in the lower house and sent to the Senate, the upper house.

Special Report

Highlights Japan’s long-term weaknesses – a shrinking population, low productivity growth, excess indebtedness – are very well known. However, it still punches above its weight in the realm of geopolitics. Abenomics – sorry, Kishidanomics – can still deliver some positive surprises every now and then. As the global pandemic wanes, and China faces a historic confluence of internal and external risks, investors should begin buying the yen on weakness. Japanese industrials also are an attractive play in a global portfolio. While the yen will likely fare better than the dollar over the next 6-9 months, it will lag other procyclical currencies. Feature Japan has always been an “earthquake society,”  in which things seem never to change until suddenly everything changes at once. The good news for investors is that that change occurred in 2011 and the latest political events reinforce policy continuity. Why “Abenomics” Remains The Playbook Over ten years have passed since Japan suffered a triple crisis of earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear meltdown. In fact, the Fukushima nuclear crisis merely punctuated a long accumulation of national malaise: the country had suffered two “Lost Decades” and was in the thrall of the Great Recession, a rare period of domestic political change, and a rise in national security fears over a newly assertive China. The nuclear meltdown marked the nadir. The result of all these crises was a miniature policy revolution in 2012 – Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) returned to power and initiated a range of bolder policies to whip the country’s deflationary mindset and reboot its foreign and trade relations. The new economic program, “Abenomics,” consisted of easy money, soft budgets, and pro-growth reforms. It succeeded in changing Japan. Both private debt and inflation, which had fallen during the lost decades, bottomed after the 2011 crisis and began to rise under Abe (Chart 1). By the 2019 House of Councillors election, however,  Abe was running out of steam. Consumption tax hikes, the US-China trade war, and COVID-19 thwarted his plans of national revival. In particular, Abe hoped to capitalize on excitement over the 2020 Tokyo Olympics to hold a popular referendum on revising the constitution. Constitutional revision is necessary to legitimize the Self-Defense Forces and thus make Japan a “normal” nation again, i.e. one that can maintain armed forces. But the global pandemic interrupted. Until the next heavyweight prime minister comes along, Japan will relapse into its old pattern of a “revolving door” of prime ministers who come and go quickly. For example, the only purpose of Abe’s immediate successor, Yoshihide Suga, was to tie off loose ends and oversee the Olympics before passing the baton (Chart 2). Chart 1Abenomics Was Making Progress The next few Japanese prime ministers will almost inevitably lack Abe’s twin supermajority in parliament, which was exceptional in modern history (Chart 3). It will be hard for the LDP to expand its regional grip given that it holds a majority in all 11 of the regional blocks in which the political parties contend for seats based on their proportion of the popular vote (Table 1). Table 1LDP+ Komeito Regional Performance Short-lived, traditional prime ministers will not be able to create a superior vision for Japan and will largely follow in Abe’s footsteps.   In September Prime Minister Fumio Kishida replaced Suga – a badly needed facelift for the ruling Liberal Democrats ahead of the October 31 election. The LDP retained its single-party majority in the Diet, so Kishida is off to a tolerable start (Chart 4). But he is far from charismatic and will not last long if he fumbles in the upper house elections in July 2022. This gives him a little more than half a year to make a mark. Kishida will oversee a roughly 30-40 trillion yen stimulus package, or supplemental budget, by the end of this year. Japanese stimulus packages are almost always over-promised and under-delivered. However, given the electoral calendar, he will put together a large package that will not disappoint financial markets. His other goal will be to build on recent American efforts to cobble together a coalition of democracies to counter China and Russia. Japan’s Grand Strategy In Brief Chart 5Japan Exposed To China Trade Japan’s grand strategy over centuries consists of maintaining its independence from foreign powers, controlling its strategic geographic approaches to prevent invasion, and stopping any single power from dominating the eastern side of the Eurasian landmass. Originally the hardest part of this grand strategy was that it required establishing unitary political control over the far-flung Japanese archipelago. However, since the Meiji Restoration, Tokyo has maintained centralized government. Since then Japan has focused on controlling its strategic approaches and maintaining a balance among the Asian powers. During the imperialist period it tried to achieve these objectives on its own. After World War II, the United States became critical to Japan’s grand strategy. Through its broad alliance with Washington, Tokyo can maintain independence, make sure critical territories are not hostile (e.g. Taiwan and South Korea), and deter neighboring threats (North Korea, China, Russia). It can at least try to maintain a balance of power in Eurasia. Yet these constant national interests underscore Japan’s growing vulnerabilities today: China’s economy is now two-times larger than Japan’s and Japan is more dependent on China’s trade than vice versa (Chart 5). Under Xi Jinping, Beijing is actively converting its wealth into military and strategic capabilities that threaten Japan’s security. Rising tensions across the Taiwan Strait are fueling nationalism and re-armament in Japan.  Russia’s post-Soviet resurgence entails an ever-closer Russo-Chinese partnership. It also entails Russian conflicts with the US that periodically upset any attempts at Russo-Japanese détente. North Korea’s asymmetric war capabilities and nuclearization pose another security threat. South Korea’s attempts to engage with the North and China, and compete with Japan, are unhelpful.    All of these realities drive Japan closer to the United States. Even the US is increasingly unpredictable, though not yet to the point of causing serious doubts about the alliance. If the US were fundamentally weakened, or abandoned the alliance, Japan would either have to adopt nuclear weapons or accommodate itself to Chinese hegemony to meet its grand strategy. Nuclearization would be the more likely avenue. The stability of Asia depends greatly on American arbitration. Japan’s Strategy Since 1990 Beneath this grand strategy Japan’s ruling elites must pursue a more particular strategy suited to its immediate time and place. Ever since Japan’s working population and property bubble peaked in the early 1990s, the country’s relative economic heft has declined. To maintain stability and security, the central government in Tokyo has had to take on a very active role in the economy and society. The first step was to stabilize the domestic economy despite collapsing potential growth. This has been achieved through a public debt supercycle (Chart 6). Unorthodox monetary and fiscal policy largely stabilized demand, at the cost of the world’s highest net debt-to-GDP ratio. The economic adjustment was spread out over a long period of time so as to prevent a massive social and political backlash. Unemployment peaked in 2009 at 5.5% and never rose above this level. The ruling elite and the Liberal Democrats maintained control of institutions and government. The second step was to ensure continued alliance with the United States. Japan could deal with its economic problems – and the rise of China – if it maintained access to US consumers and protection from the US military. To maintain the alliance required making investments in the American economy, in US-led global institutions, and cooperating with the US on various initiatives, including controversial foreign policies. As in the 1950s-60s, Japan would bulk up its Self-Defense Forces to share the burden of global security with the United States, despite the US-written constitution’s prohibition on keeping armed forces. The third step was to invest abroad and put Japan’s excess savings to work, developing materials and export markets abroad while employing foreign workers and factories to become Japan’s new industrial base in lieu of the shrinking Japanese workforce (Chart 7).  Chart 6Japan's Public Debt Supercycle Japan’s post-1990 strategy has staying power because of the massive pressures on Japan listed above: China’s rise, Russo-Chinese partnership, North Korean threats, and American distractions. Investors tend to underrate the impact of these trends on Japan. Unless they fundamentally change, Japan’s strategy will remain intact regardless of prime minister or even ruling party. Russia’s role is less clear and could serve as a harbinger of any future change. President Vladimir Putin and Abe had the best chance in modern memory to resolve the two countries’ territorial disputes, build on mutual interests, and maybe even sign a peace treaty. But Russia’s clash with the West  proved an insurmountable obstacle. New opportunities could emerge at some later juncture, as Japan’s interest in preventing China from dominating Eurasia gives it a strong reason to normalize ties with Russia. Russia will at some point worry about overdependency on China. But this change is not on the immediate horizon.  Japan’s Tactics Since 2011 Japan is nearly a one-party state. Brief spells of opposition rule, in 1993 and 2009-11, are exceptions that prove the rule. The Liberal Democrats did not fall from power so much as suffer a short “time out” to reflect on their mistakes before voters put them right back into power. However, these timeouts have been important in forcing the ruling party to adjust its tactics for changing times, as with Abenomics. Kishida will not have enough political capital to change direction. The emphasis will still be on defeating deflation and rekindling animal spirits and corporate borrowing (as opposed to relying exclusively on public debt). Kishida has talked about a new type of capitalism and a more active redistribution of wealth, in keeping with the current zeitgeist among the global elite. However, Japan lacks the impetus for dramatic change. Wealth inequality is not extreme and political polarization is non-existent (Chart 8). The LDP is wary of losing votes to the populist Japan Innovation Party, or other regional movements, but populism does not have as fertile ground in countries with low inequality.  The desire to boost wages was a central plank of Abenomics (Chart 9) and an area of success. It will come through in Kishida’s policies as well. But the ultimate outcome will depend on how tight the labor market gets in the upcoming economic cycle. Similarly Kishida can be expected to encourage, or at least not roll back, women’s participation in the labor force, as labor markets tighten (Chart 10). As the pandemic wanes it is also likely that he will reignite Abe’s loose immigration policy, which saw the number of foreign workers triple between 2010 and 2020. This inflow is perhaps the surest sign of any that insular and xenophobic Japan is changing with the times to meet its economic needs.  Chart 9Kishidanomics To Build On Abe's Wage Growth Chart 10Women Off To Work But Fertility ##br##Relapsed The only substantial difference between Kishidanomics and Abenomics is that Abe compromised his reflationary fiscal efforts by insisting on going forward with periodic hikes to the consumption tax. Kishida is under no such expectation. Instead he is operating in a global political and geopolitical context in which ambitious public investments are positively encouraged even at the expense of larger budget deficits (Chart 11). Yet interest rates are still low enough to make such investments cheaply. The stage is set for fiscal largesse. Chart 11Fiscal Largesse To Continue Kishida can be expected to promote large new investments in supply-chain resilience, renewable energy, and military rearmament. The US and EU may exempt climate policies from traditional budget accounting – Japan may do the same. Even more so than China and Europe, Japan has a national interest in renewable energy since it is almost entirely dependent on foreign imports for its fossil fuels. The green transition in Japan is lagging that of Germany but the Japanese shift away from nuclear power has gone even faster, creating an import dependency that needs to be addressed for strategic reasons (Chart 12). Monetary-fiscal coordination began under Abe and can increase under Kishida. What is clear is that public investment is the top priority while fiscal consolidation is not. Military spending is finally starting to edge up as a share of GDP, as noted above. For many years Japanese leaders talked about military spending but it remained steady at 1% of GDP. Now, at the onset of the US-China cold war, the Japanese are spending more and say the ratio will rise to 2% of GDP (Chart 13). Tensions with China, especially over Taiwan, will continue to drive this shift, though North Korea’s weapons progress is not negligible. The Biden administration is prioritizing US allies and the competition with China, which makes the Japanese alliance top of mind. Tokyo’s various attempts to talk with Beijing in recent years have amounted to nothing, with the exception of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, which is far from ratification and implementation. Japan’s relations with China are driven by interests, not passing attitudes and emotions. If Biden proves too dovish toward China – a big “if” – then it will be Japan pushing the US to take a more hawkish line rather than vice versa. Japan will take various strategic, economic, technological, and military actions to defend itself from the range of external threats it faces. These actions will intimidate and provoke China and other neighbors, which will help to entrench the “security dilemma” between the US and China and their allies. For example, Japan will eagerly participate in US efforts to upgrade its military and its regional alliances and partnerships, including via the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue with India and Australia. The Biden administration might force Japan to play nice with South Korea and patch up their trade war. But that is a price Japan can pay since American involvement also precludes any shift by South Korea fully into China’s camp. If China should invade Taiwan – which we cannot rule out over the long run – Japan’s vital supply lines and national security would fall under permanent jeopardy. Japan would have an interest in defending Taiwan but its willingness to war with China may depend on the US response. However, both Japan and the US would have to draw a stark line in defense of Japanese territory, not least Okinawa, where US troops are based. Both powers would mobilize and seek to impose a strategic containment policy around China at that point. Until The Next Earthquake … For Japan to abandon its post-1990 strategy, it would need to see a series of shocks to domestic and international politics. If China’s economy collapsed, Korea unified, or the US abandoned the Asia Pacific region, then Tokyo would have to reassess its strategy. Until then the status quo will prevail. At home Japan would need to see a split within the Liberal Democrats, or a permanent break between the LDP and their junior partner Komeito, combined with a single, consolidated, and electorally viable opposition party and a charismatic opposition leader. This kind of change would follow from major exogenous shocks. Today it is nowhere in sight – the last two shocks, in 2011 and 2020, reinforced the LDP regime. Theoretically some future Japanese government could adopt a socialist platform that relies entirely on public debt rather than trying to reboot private debt. It could openly embrace debt monetization and modern monetary theory  rather than trying to raise taxes periodically to maintain the appearance of fiscal rectitude. But if it tried to distance itself from the United States and improve relations with Russia and China, such a strategy would not go very far. It would jeopardize Japan’s grand strategy. For the foreseeable future, Japan’s economic security and national security lie in maintaining the American alliance and continuing an outward investment strategy focused on emerging markets other than China. Macroeconomic Developments The key message from an economic context is that fiscal stimulus is likely to be larger in Japan than the market currently expects. The IMF is penciling in a fiscal deficit of around 2% of potential GDP next year, which will be a drag on growth (Chart 14). More likely, Kishida will cobble together a slightly larger package to implement most of the initiatives he has proposed on the campaign trail. Meanwhile, a large share of JGBs are about to mature over the next couple of years, providing room for more issuance, which the BoJ will be happy to assimilate (Chart 15). Chart 14More Fiscal Stimulus In Japan Likely Chart 15Lots Of JGBs Mature In The Next Few Years Real numbers on the size of the fiscal package have been scarce, but it should be around 30-40 trillion yen, spread over a few years. With Japan’s net interest expense at record lows (Chart 16), and a lot of the spending slated for worthwhile productivity-enhancing projects such as supply chains, green energy, education and some boost to the financial sector in the form of digital innovation and consolidation, we expect fiscal policy in Japan will remain moderately loose, with the BoJ staying accommodative. The timing of more fiscal stimulus is appropriate as Japan has managed to finally put the pandemic behind it. The number of new Covid-19 cases is at the lowest recorded level per capita, and Japan now  has more of its population vaccinated than the US. As a result, the manufacturing and services PMIs, which have been the lowest in the developed world, could stage a coiled-spring rebound. This will be a welcome fillip for Japanese assets (Chart 17). Chart 16Little Cost To Issuing More Debt Chart 17The Japanese Recovery Has Lagged Consumption could also surprise to the upside in Japan. With the consumption tax hike of 2019 and the 2020 pandemic now behind us, pent-up demand could finally be unleashed in the coming quarters. Rising wages and high savings underscore that Japan could see a vigorous rebound in consumption, as was witnessed in other developed economies. This will be particularly the case as inflation stays low. The big risk for Japan from a macro perspective is an external slowdown, driven by China. A boom in foreign demand has been a much welcome cushion for Japanese growth, especially amidst weak domestic demand. The risk is that this tailwind becomes a headwind as Chinese growth slows, especially as a big share of Japanese exports go to China. Our view has been that policy makers in China will be able to ring-fire the property crisis, preventing a “Lehman” moment. As such, while China’s slowdown is a reality and downside risks warrant monitoring, we also expect China to avoid a hard landing. Meanwhile, Japanese exports are also diversified, with other developed and emerging markets accounting for the lion’s share of total exports. For example, exports to the US account for 19% of sales while EU exports account for 9%. Both exports and foreign machinery orders remain quite robust, suggesting that the slowdown in China will not crush all external demand (globally, export growth remains very strong).  It is noteworthy that many countries now have “carte blanche” to boost infrastructure spending, especially in areas like renewable energy and supply chain resiliency. Japan continues to remain a big supplier of capital goods globally. This will ensure that an economic recovery around the world will buffer foreign machinery orders. Market Implications Japanese equities have underperformed the US over the last decade, and Kishidanomics is unlikely to change this trend. But to the extent that more fiscal stimulus helps lift aggregate demand, a few sectors could begin to see short-term outperformance. More importantly, the underperformance of certain Japanese equity sectors have not been fully justified by the improving earnings picture (Chart 18). This suggests some room for catch-up. Banks in particular could benefit from a steeper yield curve in Japan, rising global yields and proposed reform in the sector (Chart 19). We will view this as a tactical opportunity however, than a strategic call. Our colleagues in the Global Asset Allocation service have clearly outlined key reasons against overweighting Japan, and are currently neutral.  More importantly, industrials also look poised to see some pickup in relative EPS growth, as global industrial demand stays robust. An improvement in domestic demand should also favor small caps over large caps. Chart 18ADismal Earnings Explain Some Underperformance Of Japanese Equities Chart 18BDismal Earnings Explain Some Underperformance Of Japanese Equities Chart 19Japanese Banks Will Benefit From A Steeper Yield Curve Foreigners have huge sway over the performance of Japanese assets, especially equities. Foreign holders account for nearly 30% of the Japanese equity float. This is important not only for the equity call but for currency performance as well since portfolio flows dominate currency movements. Historically, the yen and the Japanese equity market have been negatively correlated. This was due to positive profit translation effects from a lower currency. However, it is possible that Japanese domestic profits are no longer driven only by translation effects, but rather by underlying productivity gains. This could result in less yen hedging by foreign equity investors, which would restore a positive relationship between the relative share price performance and the currency. As for the yen, the best environment for any currency is when the economy can generate non-inflationary growth. Japan may well be entering this paradigm. Historically, now has been the exact environment where the yen tends to do well, as the economy exits deflation and enters non-inflationary growth (Chart 20). Chart 20The Yen And Japanese Growth Markets have been wrongly focusing on nominal rather than real yields in Japan and the implication for the yen. Therefore the risk to a long yen view is that the Bank of Japan keeps rates low as global yields are rising. However, in an environment where global inflationary pressures normalize (say in the next 6-9 months) and temper the increase in global yields, this could provide room for short covering on the yen. In our view, the yen is already the most underappreciated currency in the G10, as rising global yields have led to a massive accumulation of short positions. Finally, from a valuation standpoint, the yen is the cheapest G10 currency according to our PPP models, and is also quite cheap according to our intermediate-term timing model (Chart 21). With the yen being a risk-off currency, it also tends to rise versus the dollar not only during recessions, but also during most episodes of broad-based dollar weakness. This low-beta nature of the currency makes it a good portfolio hedge in an uncertain world. Chart 21The Yen Is Undervalued Given the historic return of geopolitical risk to Japan’s neighborhood, as the US and Japan engage in active great power competition with China, the yen is an underrated hedge. Matt Gertken Vice President Geopolitical Strategy mattg@bcaresearch.com Chester Ntonifor Vice President Foreign Exchange Strategy chestern@bcaresearch.com

The markets were deluged by a lot of information in late October. Several central banks made surprise moves towards tightening (the Bank of Canada, for example, ended asset purchases, and the Reserve Bank of Australia effectively abandoned its yield-curve control). Inflation continued to surprise on the upside (headline CPI in the US is now 5.4% year-on-year). But, at the same time, there were signs of faltering growth with, for example, US real GDP growth in Q3 coming in at only 2.0% quarter-on-quarter annualized, compared to 6.7% in Q2. This caused a flattening of the yield curve in many countries, as markets priced in faster monetary tightening but lower long-term growth (Chart 1). Nonetheless, equities shrugged off the barrage of news, with the S&P500 ending the month at a new high. All this highlights what we discussed in our latest Quarterly: That the second year of a bull market is often tricky, resulting in lower (but still positive) returns from equities and higher volatility. For risk assets to continue to outperform, our view of a Goldilocks environment needs to be “just right”: The economy must not be too hot or too cold. We think it will be – and so stay overweight equities versus bonds. But investors should be aware of the risks on either side. How too hot? Inflation is broadening out (at least in the US, UK, Australia and Canada, though not in the euro zone and Japan) and is no longer limited to items which saw unusually strong demand during the pandemic but where supply is constrained (Chart 2). Chart 1What Is The Message Of Flattening Yield Curves? Chart 2Inflation Is Broadening Out In The US There is a risk that this turns into a wage-price spiral as employees, amid a tight labor market, push for higher wages to offset rising prices. We find that wages tend to follow prices with a lag of 6-12 months (Chart 3). The Atlanta Fed Wage Tracker (good for gauging underlying wage pressures since it looks only at employees who have been in a job for 12 months or more) is already at 3.5% and looks set to rise further. On the back of these inflationary moves, the market has significantly pulled forward the date of central bank tightening. Futures now imply that the Fed will raise rates in both July and December next year (Chart 4) and that other major developed central banks will also raise multiple times over the next 14 months (Table 1). Breakeven inflation rates have also risen substantially (Chart 5). Chart 3Wages Tend To Rise After Prices Rise Chart 4Will The Fed Really Hike This Soon?   Table 1Futures Implied Path Of Rate Hikes Chart 5Breakevens Suggest Higher Inflation     We think these moves are a little excessive. There are several reasons why inflation might cool next year. Companies are rushing to increase capacity to unblock supply bottlenecks. For example, semiconductor production has already begun to increase, bringing down DRAM prices over the past few months (Chart 6). Another big contributor to broad-based inflation has been a 126% increase in container shipping costs since the start of the year (Chart 7). But currently the number of container ships on order is at a 10-year high; these new ships will be delivered over the next two years. Such deflationary forces should pull down core inflation next year (though we stick to our longstanding view that for multiple structural reasons – demographics, the end of globalization, central bank dovishness, the transition away from fossil fuels – inflation will trend up over the next five years). Chart 6DRAM Prices Falling As Production Ramps Up Chart 7All Those Ships On Order Should Bring Down Shipping Costs The Fed, therefore, will not be in a rush to raise rates. It does not see the labor market as anywhere close to “maximum employment” – it has not defined what it means by this, but we would see it as a 3.8% unemployment rate (the median FOMC dot for the equilibrium unemployment rate) and the prime-age participation rate back to its 2019 level (Chart 8). We continue to expect the first rate hike only in December next year. The Fed will feel the need to override its employment criterion only if long-term inflation expectations become unanchored – but the 5-year 5-year forward breakeven rate is only at 2.3%, within the Fed’s effective CPI target range of 2.3-2.5% (Chart 5). We remain comfortable with our view of only a moderate rise in long-term rates, with the US 10-year Treasury yield at 1.7% by end-2021, and reaching 2-2.25% at the time of the first Fed rate hike. It is also worth emphasizing that even a fairly sharp rise in long-term rates has historically almost always coincided with strong equity performance (Chart 9 and Table 2). This has again been evident in the past 12 months: When rates rose between August 2020 and March 2021, and then from July 2021, equities performed strongly. Chart 8We Are Not Back To "Maximum Employment" Chart 9Rising Rates Are Usually Accompanied By A Rising Stock Market   Table 2Episodes Of Rising Long-Term Rates Since 1990 But could the economy get too cold? We would discount the weak US GDP reading: It was mostly due to production shortages, especially in autos, which pushed down consumption on durable goods by 26% QoQ annualized, and by some softness in spending on services due to the delta Covid variant, the impact of which is now fading. US growth should continue to be supported by a combination of the $2.5 trillion of excess household savings, strong capex as companies boost their production capacity, and a further 5% of GDP in fiscal stimulus that should be passed by Congress by year-end. Similar conditions apply in other developed economies. Chart 10Real Estate Is A Big Part Of Chinese GDP We see three principal risks to this positive outlook: A new strain of Covid-19 that proves resistant to current vaccines – unlikely but not impossible. Our geopolitical strategists worry about Iran, which may have a nuclear bomb ready by December, prompting Israel to bomb the country. Iran would likely react by hampering oil supplies, even blocking the Strait of Hormuz, through which 25% of global oil flows. Chinese growth has been slowing and the impact from the problems at Evergrande is still unclear. Real estate is a major part of the Chinese economy, with residential investment comprising 10% of GDP (Chart 10) and, broadly defined to include construction and building materials, real estate overall perhaps as much as one-third. Our China strategists don’t expect the government to launch a major stimulus which would bail out the industry, since it is happy with the way that property-related lending has been shrinking in recent years (Chart 11). We expect the slowdown in Chinese credit growth to bottom out over the coming few months, but economic activity may have further to slow (Chart 12), and there is a risk that the authorities are unable to control the fallout from the property market. Chart 11Chinese Authorities Are Happy To See Slowing Property Lending Chart 12When Will Credit Growth Bottom?       Fixed Income: Given the macro environment described above, we remain underweight bonds and short duration. If we assume 1) a Fed liftoff in December 2022, 2) 100 basis points of rate hikes over the following year, and 3) a terminal Fed Funds Rate of 2.08% (the median forecast from the New York Fed’s Survey of Market Participants), 10-year US Treasurys will return -0.2% over the next 12 months, and 2-year Treasurys +0.3%.1 TIPs have overshot fair value and, although we remain neutral since they a tail-risk hedge against high inflation over the next five years, we would especially avoid 2-year TIPS which look very overvalued. We see some pockets of selective value in lower-quality high-yield bonds, specifically US Ba- and Caa-rated issues, which are still trading at breakeven spreads around the 35th historical percentile, whereas higher-rated bonds look very expensive (Chart 13). For US tax-paying investors, municipal bonds look particularly attractive at the moment, with general-obligation (GO) munis trading at a duration-matched yield higher than Treasurys even before tax considerations (Chart 14). Our US bond strategists have recently gone maximum overweight. Chart 14Muni Bonds Are A Steal     Equities: We retain our longstanding preference for US equities over other Developed Markets. US equities have outperformed this year, irrespective of whether rates were rising or falling, or how US growth was surprising relative to the rest of the world, emphasizing the much stronger fundamentals of the US market (Chart 15).  Analysts’ forecasts for the next few quarters look quite cautious, and so earnings surprises can push US stock prices up further (Chart 16). We reiterate the neutral on China but underweight on Emerging Markets ex-China that we initiated in our latest Quarterly. Our sector overweights are a mixture of cyclicals (Industrials), rising-interest-rate plays (Financials), and defensives (Heath Care). Chart 15US Equites Outperformed This Year Whatever Happened Chart 16Analysts Are Pessimistic About The Next Couple Of Quarters   Currencies: We continue to expect the US dollar to be stuck in its trading range and so stay neutral. Recent moves in prospective relative monetary policy bring us to change two of our currency recommendations. We close our underweight on the Australian dollar. The recent rise in Australian inflation (with both trimmed mean and 10-year breakevens now above 2% – Chart 17) has brought forward the timing of the first rate hike and should push up relative real rates (Chart 18). We lower our recommendation on the Japanese yen from overweight to neutral. The Bank of Japan will not raise rates any time soon, even when other central banks are tightening. This will push real-rate differentials against the yen (Chart 18, panel 2). Chart 17Australian Inflation Is Picking Up Chart 18Real Rates Moving In Favor Of The AUD And Against The JPY Chart 19Chinese-Related Metals' Prices Are Falling Commodities: We remain cautious on those industrial metals which are most sensitive to slowing Chinese growth and its weakening property market. The fall in iron ore prices since July is now being followed by aluminum. However, metals which are increasingly driven by investment in alternative energy, notably copper, are likely to hold up better (Chart 19). We are underweight the equity Materials sector and neutral on the commodities asset class. The Brent crude oil price has broadly reached our energy strategists’ forecasts of $80/bbl on average in 2022 and $81 in 2023 (Chart 20). Although the forward curve is lower than this, with December-22 Brent at only $75/bbl, it is a misapprehension to characterize this as the market forecasting that the oil price will fall. Backwardation (where futures prices are lower than spot) is the usual state of affairs for structural reasons (for example, producers hedging production forward). The market typically moves to contango only when the oil price has fallen sharply and reserves are high (Chart 21). We remain neutral on the equities Energy sector.   Chart 20Brent Has Reached Our 2022 And 2023 Forecast Level Chart 21Lower Oil Futures Don't Mean Oil Price Is Forecast To Fall Garry Evans, Senior Vice President Global Asset Allocation garry@bcaresearch.com GAA Asset Allocation  

Special Report

In this report we examine the risk of stagflation by comparing the current environment to that of the late-1960s and 1970s. Today, investors cannot rule out the possibility of a stagflationary outcome, for four reasons: long-term household inflation expectations have risen significantly over the past year; fiscal policy has been expansionary; monetary policy will remain expansionary at the Fed’s projected terminal Fed funds rate; and component shortages and price increases linked to energy market and supply chain disruptions may persist or worsen over the coming year. However, the strong demand-pull inflationary dynamics that existed in the late-1960s were mostly absent in the lead-up to the pandemic, supply-chain issues are in part due to strong goods demand and supply disruptions that will eventually dissipate, and economic agents do not expect severe price pressures to persist beyond the pandemic. On balance, this points to a stagflationary outcome over the coming 6-24 months as a risk, but not a likely event. Investors should use the Misery Index, which is the sum of the unemployment rate and headline PCE inflation, as a real-time stagflation indicator. The Misery Index underscores that the US economy is unlikely to experience true stagflation unless the unemployment rate rises. A portfolio of the US dollar, the Swiss Franc, and industrial commodities may serve as a useful hedge for investors who are concerned about absolute return prospects in a world in which long-maturity bond yields are rising and risks of stagflationary dynamics are present. Chart II-1The Misery Index Reflects The Risk Of Stagflation Over the past several weeks, concerns about a possible return to 1970s-style stagflation have re-emerged significantly in the minds of many investors. These investors have pointed toward similarities between the current environment and that of the 1970s, including shortages limiting output, a snarled global trade and logistical system, and rising energy prices. Chart II-1 highlights that the US “Misery Index” – the sum of the unemployment rate and headline PCE inflation – rose again over the past several months to high single-digit territory, after having fallen dramatically from April 2020 to February of this year. Panel 2 of Chart II-1 highlights that last year's rise in the Misery Index was driven almost entirely by the unemployment rate, whereas the current level is due to a combination of a modestly elevated unemployment rate and a pronounced acceleration in inflation. The headline PCE deflator has risen above 4%, a level that has not been reached since 1991 during the First Gulf War. In this report, we examine the risk of stagflation by comparing the current environment to that of the late 1960s and 1970s. We conclude that while investors cannot rule out the possibility of a stagflationary outcome, there are important differences that point toward a stagflation outcome over the coming 6-24 months as a risk, not a likely event. We conclude by highlighting assets that may produce absolute returns in a world in which long-maturity bond yields are rising and risks of stagflationary dynamics are present. Revisiting The 1960s And 70s Chart II-2The 1960s Laid The Groundwork For Elevated Inflation The first step in judging the risk of a return to 1970s-style stagflation is to review, in a detailed way, what caused those conditions. Investors are well aware of the role that two separate energy price shocks played in raising prices and damaging output during this period, but they are less cognizant of the impact that a persistent period of above-trend output and significant labor market tightness had in setting up the conditions for sharply higher inflation. This focus of investors on energy prices partially reflects the fact that the Misery Index increased most visibly in the 1970s and that policymakers in the 1960s may not have realized how extensively economic output was running above its potential. With the benefit of hindsight, Chart II-2 illustrates the extent to which inflationary pressures built up in the 1960s, well before the first oil price shock in 1973. The chart shows that the unemployment rate was below NAIRU – the non-accelerating inflation rate of unemployment – for 70% of the time during the 1960s, and that inflation had already responded to this in the latter half of the decade. Annual headline PCE inflation was running just shy of 5% at the onset of the 1970 recession; it fell to 3% in the aftermath of the recession, but had already begun to reaccelerate in the first half of 1973. Following the 1973/1974 recession, inflation did decelerate significantly, falling from 11-12% to 5% in headline terms, and from 10% to 6% in core terms. But the pace of price appreciation did not fall below 5-6% in the second half of the 1970s, despite a significant and sustained rise in the unemployment rate above its natural rate. The 1975 to 1978 period is especially important for investors to understand, because it is arguably the clearest period of true stagflation in the 1970s. The fact that the Misery Index rose sharply during two major oil price shocks is not particularly surprising in and of itself, given the direct impact of energy prices on headline consumer prices; it is the fact that the index remained so elevated between these shocks, the result of persistently high inflation in the face of significant labor market slack, that is most relevant to investors. There are two reasons that both inflation and unemployment remained high during this period. First, labor market slack was sizeable during these years because the US economy was more energy-intensive in the 1970s than it is today. Chart II-3 highlights that goods-producing employment lagged overall employment growth from late 1973 to late 1977, underscoring that the rise in oil prices significantly impacted jobs growth in energy-intensive industries. Second, it is clear that the combination of demand-pull inflation in the late 1960s and the predominantly cost-push inflation of the 1970s led to expectations of persistent inflation among households and firms. The original Phillips Curve, as formulated by New Zealand economist William Phillips in the late 1950s, described a negative relationship between the unemployment rate and the pace of wage growth. Given the close correlation between wage and overall price growth at the time, the Phillips Curve was soon extended and generalized to describe an inverse relationship between labor market slack and overall price inflation. But the experience of the 1970s highlighted that inflation expectations are also an important determinant of inflation, a realization that gave birth to the expectations-augmented (i.e. “modern-day”) Phillips Curve (more on this below). The Stagflation Era Versus Today Table II-1 presents a stagflation “threat matrix,” representing the Bank Credit Analyst service’s assessment of the various factors that could potentially contribute to a stagflationary environment today, relative to what occurred in the 1960s and 1970s. While we acknowledge that there are some similarities today to what occurred five decades ago, the most threatening factors have been present for a shorter period of time and appear to have a smaller magnitude than what occurred during the stagflationary era. In addition, key factors, such as the visibility available to policymakers and investors about household inflation expectations and the potential output of the economy, would appear to reduce significantly the risk of a stagflationary outcome today. We discuss each of the factors presented in Table II-1 below: Fiscal & Monetary Policy Chart II-4Government Spending Last Cycle Looked Nothing Like The 1960s The persistently tight labor market that contributed to the inflationary buildup in the 1960s occurred as a result of easy fiscal and monetary policy. Chart II-4 highlights that the contribution to real GDP growth from government expenditure and investment was very elevated in the 1960s. Chart II-5 shows that a positive output gap in the late 1960s and the first half of the 1970s is well explained by the fact that 10-year US government bond yields were persistently below nominal GDP growth. The relationship between the stance of monetary policy and the output gap only meaningfully diverged in the latter half of the 1970s, during the true stagflationary era that we noted above. Chart II-5Easy Monetary Policy Juiced Aggregate Demand In The 60s And Early 70s Chart II-6Monetary Policy Today Is Extremely Easy Today, it is clear that the stance of fiscal policy has recently been extraordinarily easy, and 10-year US government bond yields have remained well below nominal GDP growth for the better part of the last decade. Relative to estimates of potential nominal GDP growth, 10-year Treasury yields are the lowest they have been since the 1970s (Chart II-6). Ostensibly, this supports concerns that policy might contribute to a stagflationary outcome. These concerns were raised by Larry Summers in March, when he described the Biden administration’s fiscal policy as the “least responsible” that the US has experienced in four decades and warned of the potential inflationary consequences of overheating the economy.1 But there are two important counterpoints to these concerns. First, easy fiscal policy this cycle has followed a period during the last economic cycle in which government spending contributed to the most sustained drag on economic activity since the 1950s. Unlike the 1960s, the unemployment rate has been below NAIRU for only a third of the time over the past decade. In addition, Chart II-7 highlights that fiscal thrust will turn to fiscal drag next year, underscoring the temporary nature of the massive burst in fiscal spending that has occurred in response to the pandemic. Under normal circumstances, the fiscal drag implied by Chart II-7 would substantially raise the risks of a recession next year, but we have noted in previous reports that a significant amount of excess savings remain to support spending and employment. The net impact of these two factors results in a reasonable expectation that the US economy will return to maximum employment next year, but this is a far cry from the 1960s when the unemployment rate was below its natural rate for 70% of the decade. Based on conventional measures, US monetary policy has been easy for a decade, but easy monetary policy did not begin to contribute positively to a rise in household sector credit growth last cycle until 2014/2015. This underscores that the natural rate of interest (“R-star”) did fall during the early phase of the last economic expansion. However, we argued in an April report that R-star was likely rising in the latter half of the last expansion,2 and we believe that the terminal Fed funds rate is likely higher than what the Fed is currently projecting, barring any additional negative policy shocks. Thus, while we do not believe that the duration of easy monetary policy over the past decade has laid the groundwork for a major rise in prices, it is now clearly positively contributing to aggregate demand and does risk a future overshoot in prices if long maturity bond yields remain well below the pace of economic growth for a sustained period of time. The Impact Of Shortages Chart II-8Gasoline Shortages Plagued The US Economy In The 1970s Gasoline shortages occurred during the oil shocks of the 1970s and are a key similarity that some investors point toward when comparing the situation today with the stagflationary era. Chart II-8 highlights that the annual growth in real personal consumption expenditures on energy goods and services fell into negative territory on six occasions in the 1970s, although it was most pronounced during the two oil price shocks and their resulting recessions. Today, the impact of shortages appears to be broader than what occurred in the 1970s, but less impactful and not likely to be as long-lasting. Chart II-9 highlights that the OPEC oil embargo of 1973 raised the global oil bill by 2.4% of global GDP and permanently raised the price of oil. The global oil bill will only be fractionally above its pre-pandemic level in 2022, with oil prices at $80/bbl, and, while it is true that US gasoline prices have risen significantly, they are not higher than they were from 2011-2014 (Chart II-10). Chart II-9$80/bbl Oil Is Not Onerous Chart II-10US Gasoline Prices Are High, But They Have Been Higher It is certainly true that global shipping costs have skyrocketed and that this is contributing to the increase in US consumer prices. We estimate, however, that this increase in shipping costs as a share of GDP is no more than a quarter of the impact of the 1973 increase in oil prices, without the attendant negative effects on US goods-producing employment that occurred in the 1970s. If anything, surging shipping costs create an incentive to re-shore manufacturing production, which would contribute positively to US goods-producing employment. We also do not expect the rise in shipping costs to be meaningfully permanent, i.e., shipping costs may ultimately settle at a higher level than they were in late-2019, but at a much lower level than what prevails today. Chart II-11A Tight Labor Market Is Causing Wage Growth To Pick Up Semiconductor and labor shortages would appear to represent a more salient threat of stagflation in the US, as the domestic production of motor vehicles cannot occur without key inputs and a tight labor market is already contributing to an acceleration in wage growth (Chart II-11). As we noted in Section 1 of our report, auto production significantly impacted growth in the third quarter. However, Chart II-12 highlights that, for now, the breadth of impact of these shortages appears to be limited: the production component of the ISM manufacturing index remains in expansionary territory, industrial production of durable manufacturing excluding motor vehicles and parts has not broken down, and both housing starts and building permits remain above pre-pandemic levels despite this year’s downtrend in permits. Chart II-12Shortages Do Not Yet Seem To Be Broad-Based A physical shortage of components is a less relevant factor for the services side of the economy, which appears to have re-accelerated meaningfully in October. The services sector is more considerably impacted by shortages in the labor market, which seem to be linked to a still-low labor force participation rate. We noted in our September report that the decline in the participation rate has significantly overshot what would be implied by the ongoing pace of retirements. Chart II-13 highlights that this has occurred not just because of a significant retirement effect, but also because of the shadow labor force (people who want a job but are not currently looking for work) and family responsibilities. We expect that the recent expiry of expanded unemployment insurance benefits, a steady rise in the immunity of the US population, an abating Delta wave of COVID-19, and a likely upcoming reduction in school/classroom closures once the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine is approved for school-age children will likely ease the labor shortage issue over the coming several months. Output Gap Uncertainty It remains a debate among economists why policymakers maintained such easy monetary policy in the 1960s and 1970s, but Chart II-14 highlights that uncertainty about the size of the output gap may have contributed to too-low interest rates. The chart shows the unemployment rate compared with today's estimate of NAIRU, alongside a simple proxy for policymakers’ real time estimate of the natural rate of employment: the cumulative average unemployment rate in the post-war environment. To the extent that policymakers used past averages of the unemployment rate as their guide for NAIRU, Chart II-14 highlights how they may have underestimated the degree to which output was running above its potential level in the 1960s, and would not have even concluded that output was above potential in the early 1970s. Chart II-14Policymakers Overestimated Labor Market Slack In The 60s And 70s Chart II-15Policymakers Know That NAIRU Is Likely At Or Below 4% Today, the environment is quite different, because the acceleration in wage growth at the tail end of the last expansion gives policymakers and investors a good estimate of where NAIRU is. Chart II-15 highlights that wage growth accelerated in 2018/2019 in response to a sub-4% unemployment rate, which is consistent with both the Fed’s NAIRU estimate of 3.5-4.5% and Fed Vice Chair Richard Clarida’s expressed view that a 3.8% unemployment rate likely constitutes maximum employment (barring any issues with the breadth and inclusivity of the labor market recovery). It is possible that the pandemic has structurally lowered potential output, which could mean that policymakers may no longer rely on the wage growth / unemployment relationship that existed in the latter phase of the last expansion. However, we do not find any credible arguments that would support the notion of a structurally lower level of potential output: the pandemic is likely to end at some point in the not-too-distant future, the negative impact of working-from-home policies on office properties and employment in central business districts is not sizeable,3 and productivity may have permanently increased in some industries because of the likely stickiness of a hybrid work culture. The Behavior Of Inflation Expectations Chart II-16Rising Long-Term Expectations Have Merely Normalized (For Now) One parallel to the argument that policymakers may have underestimated the degree of labor market tightness in the 1960s and early 1970s is the fact that they did not yet understand that inflation expectations are an important determinant of actual inflation, nor were they able to monitor them even if they did. Most credible surveys of inflation expectations began in the 1980s, and policymakers in the 1960s and 1970s were guided by the original Phillips Curve that solely related inflation to unemployment. Today, policymakers have the experience of the stagflationary episode to serve as a warning not to allow inflation expectations to get out of control, and both policymakers and investors have reliable measures of inflation expectations for households and market-participants. Chart II-16 highlights that households expect significant inflation over the coming year, but also expect prices over the longer term to rise at a pace that is almost exactly in line with their average from 2000-2014. The Rudd Controversy: (Adaptive) Inflation Expectations Do Matter One potential criticism of the idea that inflation expectations are signaling a low risk of higher future inflation has emerged through arguments made by Jeremy Rudd, a Federal Reserve economist. In a recent paper, Rudd questioned the view that households’ and firms’ expectations of future inflation are a key determinant of actual inflation; he suggested instead that relatively stable inflation since the mid-1990s might reflect a situation in which inflation simply does not enter workers’ employment decisions and expectations are irrelevant. Rudd’s paper was primarily addressed to policymakers who view inflation dynamics in a highly quantitative light. A full response to the paper would be mostly academic and thus not especially relevant to investors; however, we would like to highlight three points related to the Rudd piece that we feel are important.4 First, we disagree with Rudd’s argument that the trend in inflation has not responded to changes in economic conditions since the mid-1990s. Chart II-17 highlights that while the magnitude of the relationship has shifted, the trend in inflation relative to a measure of long-term expectations based on prior actual inflation has mimicked that of the output gap. The fact that inflation was (ironically) too high during the early phase of the last economic cycle provides some support for Rudd’s inflation responsiveness view, although we would still point toward the Fed’s strong record of maintaining low and stable inflation, its active communication with the public in the years following the global financial crisis, and the fact that a recovery began and the output gap began to (slowly) close as the best explanation for the avoidance of deflation during that period. Second, we agree with Rudd’s point that regime shifts in inflation’s responsiveness to economic conditions can occur, and that adaptive measures of inflation expectations, and even surveys of inflation, may not capture such a shift in real time. Chart II-18 shows that the 2014-2016 period was a good example of this, when adaptive expectations as well as household survey measures of long-term inflation expectations both lagged the actual decline in inflation that was caused by a collapse in the price of oil. Chart II-17The Trend In Inflation Continues To Respond To Economic Conditions Chart II-18Surveyed Inflation Expectations Can Lag, But This Time They Led But Chart II-18 also shows that long-term household survey measures of inflation led the rise in actual inflation (and thus our adaptive expectations measure) last year, underscoring that these measures are likely more reliable indicators today of whether a major regime shift is occurring. As noted above, long-term expectations have risen significantly relative to what prevailed prior to the pandemic, but this has merely raised expectations from extraordinarily depressed levels back to the average that prevailed prior to (and immediately after) the global financial crisis. Therefore, household expectations are not yet at dangerous levels. Chart II-19Unit Labor Costs Modestly Lead Inflation, But Are Far From Extreme Third, one of the core observations in Rudd’s paper is that unit labor cost (ULC) growth leads the trend in inflation, which he argued was evidence against the idea that expectations of future inflation are a key determinant of actual inflation. Chart II-19 highlights that Rudd is correct that ULC growth modestly leads inflation (especially core inflation), but we disagree with his conclusion that it argues against the importance of expectations. As we noted in Section 2 of our January 2021 Bank Credit Analyst,5 one crucial aspect of the expectations-augmented, or “modern-day” Phillips Curve is that, if inflation expectations are largely formed based on the experience of past inflation, then inflation is ultimately determined by three dimensions of the output gap: whether it is rising or falling, whether it is above or below zero, and how long it has been above or below zero. Our view is that ULC growth is fundamentally linked to slack in the labor market, which is directly incorporated in output gap measures. As we noted above, investors currently have a good estimate of the magnitude of the output/employment gap, meaning that it is possible to track the inflationary consequences of prevailing aggregate demand. As a final point about ULC growth, Chart II-19 highlights that while the five-year CAGR of unit labor costs is currently running at its strongest pace since the global financial crisis, investors should note that it remains well below the levels that prevailed in the late-1960s when persistently above-potential output laid the groundwork for a massive inflationary overshoot. Conclusions And Investment Strategy Our review of the 1960s and 1970s highlights that stagflation is a phenomenon in which supply-side shocks raise prices of key inputs to production, which lowers output and raises unemployment. Energy price shocks in the 1970s occurred after a long period of policy-driven above-trend growth in the 1960s, meaning that both demand-pull and cost-push inflation contributed to stagflation in the 1970s. Today, investors cannot rule out the possibility of a stagflationary outcome, for four reasons: long-term household inflation expectations have risen significantly over the past year; fiscal policy has been very expansionary; monetary policy will remain expansionary at the Fed’s projected terminal Fed funds rate; and component shortages and price increases linked to energy market and supply chain disruptions may persist or worsen over the coming year. Chart II-20It Is Not Stagflation If The Unemployment Rate Continues To Fall However, the strong demand-pull inflationary dynamics that existed in the late-1960s were mostly absent in the lead-up to the pandemic, supply-chain issues are in part the result of strong goods demand and disruptions that are clearly linked to the pandemic (and thus will eventually dissipate), and long-term inflation expectations are behaving differently than short-term expectations, signaling that economic agents do not expect severe price pressures to persist beyond the pandemic. Policymakers also have more visibility about the magnitude of economic / labor market slack than they did during the stagflationary era and better tools to track inflation expectations. On balance, this points to a stagflationary outcome over the coming 6-24 months as a risk, but not as a likely event. Using the Misery Index as real-time stagflation indicator, investors should note that the US economy is not likely experiencing true stagflation unless the unemployment rate rises. Chart II-20 highlights that there is no evidence yet of a contraction in goods-producing or service-producing jobs. Even if goods-producing employment slows meaningfully over the coming few months as a result of component shortages, the unemployment rate is still likely to fall if services spending normalizes, as it would imply that the gap in services-producing employment, which is currently 20% of the level of pre-pandemic goods-producing employment, will continue to close. Investors have been focused on the issue of stagflation because its occurrence would imply a sharply negative correlation between stock prices and bond yields. This is not our base case view, but we have highlighted that months with negative returns from both stocks and long-maturity bonds tend to be associated with periods of monetary policy tightening (or in anticipation of such periods). As we discussed in Section 1 of our report, we do expect the Fed to raise interest rates next year. We do not see a rise in bond yields to levels implied by the Fed’s interest rates projections as being seriously threatening to economic activity, corporate earnings growth, or equity multiples. But the adjustment to higher long-maturity bond yields may unnerve equity investors for a time, implying temporary periods of a negative stock price / bond yield correlation. Table II-2 highlights that, since 1980, commodities, the US dollar, and the Swiss franc have typically earned positive returns during non-recessionary months in which stock and long-maturity bond returns are negative. While the dollar is not likely to perform well in a stagflationary scenario, Chart II-21 highlights that CHF-USD and industrial commodities performed quite well in the late-1970s. As such, a portfolio of these three assets might serve as a useful hedge for investors who are concerned about absolute return prospects in a world in which long-maturity bond yields are rising and risks of stagflationary dynamics are present. Chart II-21The Swiss Franc and Raw Industrials Did Well During The Stagflationary Era Jonathan LaBerge, CFA Vice President The Bank Credit Analyst Footnotes 1  “Summers Sees ‘Least Responsible’ Fiscal Policy in 40 Years,” Bloomberg News, March 20, 2021. 2 Please see The Bank Credit Analyst “R-star, And The Structural Risk To Stocks,” dated March 31, 2021, available at bca.bcaresearch.com 3 Please see The Bank Credit Analyst “Work From Home “Stickiness” And The Outlook For Monetary Policy,” dated June 24, 2021, available at bca.bcaresearch.com 4 Rudd, Jeremy B. (2021). “Why Do We Think That Inflation Expectations Matter for Inflation? (And Should We?),” Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2021-062. Washington: Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. 5  Please see The Bank Credit Analyst “The Modern-Day Phillips Curve, Future Inflation, And What To Do About It,” dated December 18, 2021, available at bca.bcaresearch.com

In lieu of next week’s report, I will be presenting the quarterly Counterpoint webcast titled ‘Where Is The Groupthink Wrong? (Part 2)’. I do hope you can join. Highlights If a continued surge in the oil price – or other commodity or goods prices – started driving up the 30-year T-bond yield, the markets and the economy would feel the pain. We reiterate that the pain point at which the Fed would be forced to volte-face is only around 30 bps away on the 30-year T-bond, equal to a yield of around 2.4-2.5 percent. That would be a great buying opportunity for bonds. Given the proximity of this pain point, it is too late to short bonds, or for equity investors to rotate into value and cyclical equity sectors. That tactical opportunity has almost played out. On a 6-month and longer horizon, equity investors should prefer long-duration defensive sectors such as healthcare. Chinese long-duration bond yields are on a structural downtrend. Fractal analysis: The Korean won is oversold. Feature Many people have noticed the suspicious proximity of oil price surges to subsequent economic downturns – most recently, the 1999-2000 trebling of crude and the subsequent 2000-01 downturn, and the 2007-2008 trebling of crude and the subsequent 2008-09 global recession. Begging the question, should we be concerned about the trebling of the crude oil price since March 2020? Of course, we know that the root cause of both the 2000-01 downturn and the 2008-09 recession was not the oil price surge that preceded them. As their names make crystal clear, the 2001-01 downturn was the dot com bust and the 2008-09 recession was the global financial crisis. And yet, and yet… while the oil price surge was not the culprit, it was certainly the accessory to both murders, by driving up the bond yield and tipping an already fragile market and economy over the brink. Today, could oil become the accessory to another murder? (Chart I-1) Chart I-1AOil Was The Accessory To The Murder In 2008... Chart I-1B...Could It Become The Accessory To Another Murder?   Oil Is The Accessory To Many Murders Turn the clock back to the 1970s, and it might seem more straightforward that the recession of 1974 was the direct result of the oil shock that preceded it. Yet even in this case, we can argue that oil was the accessory, rather than the true culprit of that murder. It is correct that the specific timing, magnitude, and nature of OPEC supply cutbacks were closely related to geopolitical events – especially the US support for Israel in the Arab-Israeli war of October 1973. Yet as neat and popular as this explanation is, it ignores a bigger economic story: the collapse in August 1971 of the Bretton Woods ‘pseudo gold standard’, which severed the fixed link between the US dollar and quantities of commodities. To maintain the real value of oil, the OPEC countries were raising the price of crude oil well before October 1973. Meaning that while geopolitical events may have influenced the precise timing and magnitude of price hikes, OPEC countries were just ‘staying even’ with the collapsing real value of the US dollar, in which oil was priced. Seen in this light, the true culprit of the recession was the collapse of the Bretton Woods system, and the oil price surge through 1973-74 was just the accessory to the murder (Chart I-2). Chart I-2In 1973-74, OPEC Was Just 'Staying Even' With A Collapsing Real Value Of The Dollar A quarter of a century later in 1999, the oil price again trebled within a short time span – and by the turn of the millennium, the ensuing inflationary fears had pushed up the 10-year T-bond yield from 4.5 percent to almost 7 percent (Chart I-3). With stocks already looking expensive versus bonds, it was this increase in the bond yield – rather than a decline in the equity earnings yield – that inflated the equity bubble to its bursting point in early 2000 (Chart I-4). Chart I-3In 1999, As Oil Surged, So Did The Bond Yield... Chart I-4...Making Expensive Equities Even More Expensive To repeat, for the broader equity market, the last stage of the bubble was not so much that stocks became more expensive in absolute terms (the earnings yield was just moving sideways). Rather, stock valuations worsened markedly relative to sharply higher bond yields. Seen in this light, the oil price surge through 1999 was once again the accessory to the murder. Eight years later in 2007-08, the oil price once again trebled with Brent crude reaching an all-time high of $146 per barrel in July 2008. Again, the inflationary fears forced the 10-year T-bond yield to increase, from 3.25 percent to 4.25 percent during the early summer of 2008 (Chart I-5) – even though the Federal Reserve was slashing the Fed funds rate in the face of an escalating financial crisis (Chart I-6). Chart I-5In 2008, As Oil Surged, So Did The Bond Yield... Chart I-6...Even Though The Fed Was Slashing Rates In The Face Of A Financial Crisis Suffice to say, driving up bond yields in the summer of 2008 – in the face of the Fed’s aggressive rate cuts and a global financial system teetering on the brink – was not the smartest thing that the bond market could do. On the other hand, neither could it override its Pavlovian fears of the oil price trebling. Seen in this light, the oil price surge through 2007-08 was once again the accessory to the murder. Inflationary Fears May Once Again Lead To Murder Fast forward to today, and the danger of the recent trebling of the oil price comes not from the oil price per se. Instead, just as in 2000 and 2008, the danger comes from its potential to drive up bond yields, which can tip more systemically important economic and financial fragilities over the brink. One such fragility is the extreme sensitivity of highly-valued growth stocks to the 30-year T-bond yield, as explained in The Fed’s ‘Pain Point’ Is Only 30 Basis Points Away. On this note, one encouragement is that while shorter duration yields have risen sharply through October, the much more important 30-year T-bond yield has just gone sideways. A much bigger systemic fragility lies in the $300 trillion global real estate market, as explained in The Real Risk Is Real Estate (Part 2). Specifically, the global real estate market has undergone an unprecedented ten-year boom in which prices have doubled in every corner of the world. Over the same period, rents have risen by just 30 percent, which has depressed the global rental yield to an all-time low of 2.5 percent. Structurally depressed rental yields are justified by structurally depressed 30-year bond yields. Therefore, any sustained rise in 30-year bond yields risks undermining the foundations of the $300 trillion global real estate market (Chart I-7). Chart I-7Structurally Depressed Rental Yields Are Justified By Structurally Depressed 30-Year Bond Yields Nowhere is this truer than in China, where prime real estate yields in the major cities are at a paltry 1 percent. In this context, the recent woes of real estate developer Evergrande are just the ‘canary in the coalmine’ warning of an extremely fragile Chinese real estate sector. This will put downward pressure on China’s long-duration bond yields. As my colleague, BCA China strategist, Jing Sima, points out, “Chinese long-duration bond yields are on a structural downtrend…yields are likely to move structurally to a lower bound.” But it is not just in China. Real estate is at record high valuations everywhere and contingent on no major rise in long-duration bond yields. In the US, there is a tight relationship between the (inverted) 30-year bond yield and mortgage applications for home purchase (Chart I-8), and a tight relationship between mortgage applications for home purchase and building permits (Chart I-9). Thereby, higher bond yields threaten not only real estate prices. They also threaten the act of building itself, an important swing factor in economic activity. Chart I-8The Bond Yield Drives Mortgage Applications... Chart I-9...And Mortgage Applications Drive Building Permits To repeat, focus on the 30-year T-bond yield – as this is the most significant driver for both growth stock valuations, and for real estate valuations and activity. To repeat also, the 30-year T-bond yield has been generally well-behaved over the past few months. But if a continued surge in the oil price – or other commodity or goods prices – started driving up the 30-year T-bond yield, the markets and the economy would feel pain. And at some point, this pain would force the Fed to volte-face. We reiterate that this pain point is only around 30 bps away, equal to a yield on 30-year T-bond of around 2.4-2.5 percent – a level that would be a great buying opportunity for bonds. Given the proximity of this pain point, it is too late to short bonds or for equity investors to rotate into value and cyclical equity sectors. That tactical opportunity has almost played out. On a 6-month and longer horizon, equity investors should prefer long-duration defensive sectors such as healthcare. The Korean Won Is Oversold Finally, in this week’s fractal analysis, we note that the Korean won is oversold – specifically versus the Chinese yuan on the 130-day fractal structure of that cross (Chart I-10). Chart I-10The Korean Won Is Oversold Given that previous instances of such fragility have reliably indicated trend changes, this week’s recommended trade is long KRW/CNY, setting the profit target and symmetrical stop-loss at 2 percent.   Dhaval Joshi Chief Strategist dhaval@bcaresearch.com Fractal Trading System Fractal Trades 6-Month Recommendations Structural Recommendations Closed Fractal Trades   Indicators To Watch - Bond Yields Chart II-1Indicators To Watch - Bond Yields ##br##- Euro Area Chart II-2Indicators To Watch - Bond Yields ##br##- Europe Ex Euro Area Chart II-3Indicators To Watch - Bond Yields ##br##- Asia Chart II-4Indicators To Watch - Bond Yields ##br##- Other Developed   Indicators To Watch - Interest Rate Expectations Chart II-5Indicators To Watch - Interest Rate Expectations Chart II-6Indicators To Watch - Interest Rate Expectations Chart II-7Indicators To Watch - Interest Rate Expectations Chart II-8Indicators To Watch - Interest Rate Expectations  

Dear client, In addition to this week’s brief report, we presented at our annual BCA conference on the challenges to the US dollar’s reserve status. If you missed the session, please contact your account representative for a replay. Kind regards, Chester   Highlights The gold/silver ratio is relapsing anew. This has historically been a bearish omen for the dollar. Many petrocurrencies have lagged the rise in oil prices, and offer a very attractive carry. Go long a basket of oil producers (NOK, RUB, MXN and COP) versus the euro. Currency volatility is too low, and is bound to rise. Stay long CHF/NZD on this basis. Remain tactically long EUR/GBP as a play on slight policy convergence between the UK and the euro area. Feature Chart I-1Being Short The Dollar Has Hurt This Year Investing in currencies is tough. One of the reasons is that the currency market is the melting pot of a confluence of catalysts. These range from relative growth dynamics, policy divergences, sector biases that dictate portfolio flows and politics, among many other factors. Our bias has always been that acting on perfect information is a highly improbable feat because we are not insiders. As such, in April 2020, we designed a rules-based model to see if, over time, currencies could be traded purely based on publicly available information. Our results, grounded on the fundamental basis that has defined the BCA approach, was a positive surprise (Chart I-1). Armed with this conviction, this week’s bulletin is focused on a few themes we have held and trading opportunities around these. In a nutshell, a positive bias on any currency can be calibrated on a good macro catalyst, a valuation cushion, and going against the consensus. An Inflation Hedge On A Reflationary Boom It is becoming more evident that inflation might prove stickier than most policymakers expect. This is bad news for real interest rates. Negative real rates have been historically positive for gold and other precious metals. Within this sphere, our preference has been silver. First, silver is a reflationary metal and tends to do well when global growth is strong and the dollar is falling (Chart I-2). Since the onset of the COVID-19 crisis, silver has had a near-perfect negative correlation with the dollar (Chart I-3).   Chart I-2Gold, Silver, And the Dollar Chart I-3Silver Is A Good Reflation Play There are also an economic and valuation cases to be made for silver. Economically, silver is a byproduct of both copper and zinc mining, which have had supply-side disruptions. Meanwhile, a boom in goods demand has boosted the demand for silver, which mainly goes into electronics production. The combination is leading to a deficit in the silver demand/supply balance (Chart I-4). On the valuation side, the fair value for the gold/silver ratio is near 50, which has been the mean since the 18th century (Chart I-5) Chart I-4Silver Has A Supply Deficit Chart I-5Gold Is Expensive Relative To Silver   Fundamentally, both silver and gold are precious metals. Just like gold, silver benefits from low interest rates, plentiful liquidity, and the incentive for currency wars and fiat money debasement. However, the gold/silver ratio tends to peak when the environment migrates from reflationary to inflationary (Chart I-6). As such, silver is a good inflationary hedge amidst a reflationary boom. This brings us to the sweet spot for silver. Even if global growth remains tepid over the next few months, a lot of the bad news is already reflected in silver prices, especially vis-à-vis gold. Relative speculative positioning hit a low of -25% as a percent of open interest. Relative sentiment on gold is 10% higher relative to silver. This is bullish from a contrarian perspective (Chart I-7). Chart I-6Silver Does Well With Rising Inflation Chart I-7Silver Has Been Shunned Relative To Gold Higher Currency Volatility Currency volatility is likely to rise in the coming months. Options markets offer many opportunities to trade this theme, but being long CHF/NZD is an attractive bet as well (Chart I-8). The kiwi is backed by a very hawkish central bank that will likely dial back its rhetoric amid much uncertainty about the growth outlook. Meanwhile, the kiwi is expensive according to most of our models. As such, we expect the kiwi to rise vis-à-vis the greenback over a cyclical horizon, but we feel it is at risk on a tactical basis. Chart I-8CHF/NZD Tracks Dollar Volatility The RBNZ has decided to introduce house price considerations into its mandate. While this is politically palatable, it is economically unviable as rising real estate prices are a global phenomenon. The risk is that a hawkish RBNZ tilts the economy over, especially if the current environment is stagflationary. As such, we are short the NZD at the crosses. Our long AUD/NZD position is based on policy convergence between Australia and New Zealand and our long CHF/NZD is based on rising currency volatility. We were stopped out of our long CHF/NZD position and are reinitiating the trade today. A Play On Higher Oil Prices Oil prices are likely to stay elevated in the coming months. But even if they relapse, a bet on being long oil producers versus consumers could still prove profitable. Petrocurrencies have lagged the performance of oil tremendously (Chart I-9). This is especially the case when looking at oil-producing countries versus oil-consuming ones. RUB, COP, and MXN are trading well below their implied levels relative to the USD, EUR, and RMB. Chart I-9Petrocurrencies Will Catch Up With Oil Price A lot of oil players are seeing a rebound in their economies, as their populations get vaccinated. Russia, Mexico, Brazil, and Colombia all have lower new COVID-19 incidences, compared to earlier this year and versus the US (Chart I-10). As a result, economic activity is rebounding in these countries relative to the US (Chart I-11). Our bias is that the dollar will resume its cyclical bear market in the coming months. This will push up many petrocurrencies, as the path of the dollar usually dictates the performance of many developed and emerging market currencies (Chart I-12). Chart I-10A Drop In Infections Outside The US... Chart I-11...Leading To A Recovery In Growth       Chart I-12Petrocurrencies Track The Dollar The big risk is a slowdown in China, which will have a meaningful impact on oil demand. The Chinese credit impulse correlates quite well with commodity and oil currencies, and therefore, should the impulse slow further, this will meaningfully impact import demand (Chart I-13). Our bias is that there is little downside to the credit impulse in China, while the imperative to stimulate the economy could be rising. So far, the authorities have been able to ringfire the crisis with no meaningful capital outflows (Chart I-14). Chart I-13China Slowdown A Risk... Chart I-14...But No Systemic Risk Yet   On the sentiment and valuation fronts, the case for petrocurrencies is more compelling. Starting with valuation, all of our models show many petrocurrencies as deeply undervalued. On a real effective exchange rate basis, the MXN, COP, and BRL are trading well below historical averages (Chart I-15). On the sentiment front, it is true that many petrocurrencies have lagged the increase in oil prices amid domestic demand concerns. This is bound to change as populations get vaccinated and their economies reopen. More importantly, many petrocurrencies sport very attractive real rates (Chart I-16). If our bias on a dollar decline proves correct, then the carry will be an added bonus. As such, we recommend going long a basket of RUB, COP, and MXN against the euro Chart I-15Most Petrocurrencies Are Cheap Chart I-16Petrocurrencies Have An Attractive Carry   Chester Ntonifor Foreign Exchange Strategist chestern@bcaresearch.com Currencies U.S. Dollar Chart II-1USD Technicals 1 Chart II-2USD Technicals 2 The US economy remains relatively robust: Retail sales came in at 1.8% month-on-month in September, well above consensus of an 0.8% increase. Sentiment in the US is drifting lower, according to the Michigan survey. The current conditions component of the index slipped from 80.1 to 77.9 in October. The sentiment component also fell from 72.8 to 71.4. Portfolio flows into the US remained strong with net TIC inflows of $US 126bn. Both housing starts and building permits rose in September. Ditto for existing home sales, that increased from 5.88mn to 6.29mn. The US dollar DXY index fell this week. The general tone to markets has been risk on, which has led to less demand for the safe-haven dollar. Meanwhile, according to CFTC data, speculators are very long the dollar which is bearish from a contrarian perspective.   Report Links: Arbitrating Between Dollar Bulls And Bears - March 19, 2021 The Dollar Bull Case Will Soon Fade - March 5, 2021 Are Rising Bond Yields Bullish For The Dollar? - February 19, 2021 The Euro Chart II-3EUR Technicals 1 Chart II-4EUR Technicals 2 Euro area data was mixed this week: New car registrations fell by 23% year-on-year in September. The trade balance came in at €11.1bn, a robust number but below expectations of a €14.2bn surplus. Consumer confidence keeps deteriorating in the euro area amidst the energy crisis. The euro was up 0.2% this week. EUR/USD has had a wild ride in recent weeks, having breached below 1.16. That said, the tides are turning in favor of the euro. Speculators are short the currency, and interest rate expectations for the euro area are bombed out relative to other developed markets. This provides room for positive surprises.  Report Links: Relative Growth, The Euro, And The Loonie - April 16, 2021 The Euro Dance: One Step Back, Two Steps Forward - April 2, 2021 On Japanese Inflation And The Yen - January 29, 2021 The Japanese Yen Chart II-5JPY Technicals 1 Chart II-6JPY Technicals 2 Recent Japanese data has been mixed: Condominium sales fell be 6.7% year-on-year in September. Trade remains robust. Exports rose by 15% year-on-year, while imports surged by 38.6% year-on-year. Supermarket sales increased 3.2% year-on-year in September. The yen rose 20bps this week. We were bullish the yen around 109, and even more bullish at current levels. The two things that have thrown this view offside are 1) an abrupt rise in US yields, that has attracted Treasury bids from Japanese investors and 2) profit taking by foreign investors who did catch the Japan outperformance in August. On the other side of the coin, the yen is now one of the most shorted G10 currencies, and Japanese data has been so poor relative to the rest of the G10 that some measure of catchup is due. Report Links: The Case For Japan - June 11, 2021 The Dollar Bull Case Will Soon Fade - March 5, 2021 On Japanese Inflation And The Yen - January 29, 2021 British Pound Chart II-7GBP Technicals 1 Chart II-8GBP Technicals 2 The key data release out of the UK this week was the inflation report: Headline CPI came in at 3.1% year-on-year in September, in line with expectations. Core CPI came in at 2.9% year-on-year in September, in line with expectations. RPI an PPI came in at 4.9% and 11.4% respectively. The pound rose by 0.3% this week. The UK is dealing with and energy and inflation crisis, similar to the rest of the world. This is bringing forward expectations of a rate hike by the BoE, which we believe would be the wrong approach should inflation subside. We are bullish sterling on a cyclical horizon, but are also long EUR/GBP tactically as a play on a policy convergence between the BoE and the ECB. Report Links: Why Are UK Interest Rates Still So Low? - March 10, 2021 Portfolio And Model Review - February 5, 2021 Thoughts On The British Pound - December 18, 2020 Australian Dollar Chart II-9AUD Technicals 1 Chart II-10AUD Technicals 2 The was scant data out of Australia this week: The services PMI rebounded strongly in September, from 45.5 to 52. The manufacturing PMI remained robust, rising from 56.8 to 57.3 in October. As a result, the composite PMI improved from 46 to 52.2. The AUD rose 0.6% this week. The AUD is sitting on a coiled spring and ripe for a rebound. First, the energy crisis is bullish for Australia as it is one of the largest coal and natural gas exporters. Second the AUD is cheap, especially on a terms of trade basis. At the crosses, we are long AUD/NZD as a play on these trends. Report Links: The Dollar Bull Case Will Soon Fade - March 5, 2021 Portfolio And Model Review - February 5, 2021 Australia: Regime Change For Bond Yields & The Currency? - January 20, 2021 New Zealand Dollar Chart II-11NZD Technicals 1 Chart II-12NZD Technicals 2 The was scant data out of New Zealand this week: CPI exploded higher, rising 4.9% in the third quarter. Credit card spending was down 12.9% year-on-year in September. The NZD rose by 1.2% week. The inflation report out of New Zealand unsettled markets, pushing up bond yields significantly and propping the currency. Given the RBNZ has a mandate to consider house prices in policy settings, this has led to bets of more aggressive policy tightening in New Zealand. We continue to believe the NZD will fare well cyclically, but hawkish expectations from the RBNZ are already priced. This provides room for disappointment. We are long AUD/NZD on this basis. Report Links: How High Can The Kiwi Rise? - April 30, 2021 Portfolio And Model Review - February 5, 2021 Currencies And The Value-Versus-Growth Debate - July 10, 2020 Canadian Dollar Chart II-13CAD Technicals 1 Chart II-14CAD Technicals 2 Data out of Canada this week has been robust: The CPI report was buoyant. Headline came in a 4.4%, core-trim came in at 3.4%, core-median was 2.8% and core-common was 1.8% year-on-year. Foreigners continue to favor Canadian securities. Inflows for August rose to C$26.3bn, well above a prior print of C$14.2bn. The Business outlook survey from the Bank of Canada was robust in the third quarter, but thew future sales outlook did fall from 47 to 9, a sharp deterioration. The CAD was flat this week. On a cyclical basis, the CAD is backed by robust oil prices, and orthodox central bank that will raise rates to curb high inflation and real estate speculation, and an economy that remains on a recovery path. As such, our bias is that the path of least resistance for the CAD is up. Report Links: Relative Growth, The Euro, And The Loonie - April 16, 2021 Will The Canadian Recovery Lead Or Lag The Global Cycle? - February 12, 2021 The Outlook For The Canadian Dollar - October 9, 2020 Swiss Franc Chart II-15CHF Technicals 1 Chart II-16CHF Technicals 2 The Swiss economy is on the mend: Total sight deposits were flat at CHF 714bn in the week ended October 15. Exports rose 0.4% month-on-month in September, while imports fell 0.8% month-on-month. The money supply rose 3.2% in September, in line with the August print. CHF rose by 0.5% this week. CHF remains a good hedged against rising currency volatility, which we believe will materialize on a cyclical horizon. That said, the swiss franc will lag the euro and other European currencies, if our view of a pickup in growth next year proves correct. Report Links: An Update On The Swiss Franc - April 9, 2021 Portfolio And Model Review - February 5, 2021 The Dollar Conundrum And Protection - November 6, 2020 Norwegian Krone Chart II-17NOK Technicals 1 Chart II-18NOK Technicals 2 There was scant data out of Norway this week: The trade balance improved from NOK 42.6bn to NOK 53.7bn in September. The NOK was up 0.7% this week. High oil prices are a boost for the NOK, especially with the opening of the energy pipeline with the UK. We also favor the NOK on valuation grounds. Stay short EUR/NOK and USD/NOK. Report Links: The Norwegian Method - June 4, 2021 Portfolio And Model Review - February 5, 2021 Revisiting Our High-Conviction Trades - September 11, 2020 Swedish Krona Chart II-19SEK Technicals 1 Chart II-20SEK Technicals 2 There was scant data out of Sweden this week: The unemployment rate fell from 8.5% to 8.2% in September. The SEK rose 15 bps this week. We are short both EUR/SEK and USD/SEK as reflation plays. The SEK will rise very quickly should the Chinese credit impulse bottom, a likely event in our view. Meanwhile, the central bank will end QE this year and could bring forward expectations of a rate hike. Report Links: Revisiting Our High-Conviction Trades - September 11, 2020 More On Competitive Devaluations, The CAD And The SEK - May 1, 2020 Sweden Beyond The Pandemic: Poised To Re-leverage - March 19, 2020 Trades & Forecasts Strategic View Cyclical Holdings (6-18 months) Tactical Holdings (0-6 months) Limit Orders Forecast Summary