Insights

Our Global Asset Allocation strategists upgrade equities to overweight at the expense of cash, moving EU equities from overweight to underweight while upgrading the US to neutral. Our colleagues argue AI remains the central market thesis despite the oil shock. Recent hyperscaler results reinforce th...

The April Conference Board survey beat estimates, with both current conditions and expectations improving. Consumer confidence rose to 92.8 from 92.2, when consensus expected a pullback. Consumers’ assessment of their present situation was mostly flat after positive revisions to the prior month, whi...

Our DM ex. US and GeoMacro strategists argue the dollar remains dominant but no longer holds a monopoly on reserve functions. The global monetary order is transitioning away from dollar dominance toward a regime with multiple reserve anchors. The dollar’s three core roles (international settlement, ...

The April flash PMIs show that the global energy shock is feeding through unevenly, with sharper price pressures outside the US. Longer delivery times were widespread across developed markets, and input prices rose. One of our most timely tools for tracking inflation is our price pressure index, whi...

Our GeoMacro strategists argue that prevailing market narratives around the Gulf conflict rest on three flawed assumptions. First, that the UAE’s role as a financial hub is at risk; second, that Iran can sustain a closure of the Strait of Hormuz; and third, that the conflict is primarily about press...

European sentiment plunged in March, reflecting vulnerability to higher energy prices. The ZEW expectations index fell sharply to -8.5 from 39.4 at the Euro Area level and to -0.5 from 58.3 in Germany. German current conditions were better than estimates but remain deeply pessimistic at -62.9. The d...

Our US Equity strategists dove into macro’s explanatory power in driving sector returns and fundamentals. Using principal component analysis, they show that growth, inflation, and rate risk together account for nearly three-quarters of sector return variation.  Macro risks also influence f...

Cross-asset correlations remain the clearest signal of how investors are pricing the energy shock. Risk assets rebounded late Monday after President Trump described the Iran war as “very complete, pretty much.” However, the outcome depends on Iran’s response, leadership cohesion, and willingness to ...

Our Global Investment strategists argue that AI threatens the traditional profit engines of large technology firms despite boosting productivity. Tech companies have historically relied on economies of scale, network effects, and proprietary technologies, but AI may erode these advantages. Although ...

US assets have underperformed year-to-date, but BCA views differ on the tactical versus 12-month outlook. Since the start of the year, US markets have lagged the rest of the world, largely driven by the sell-off in software and AI-related stocks. The next phase for US versus the rest of the world wa...