Developed Countries

Executive Summary An inverted yield curve is a reliable recession indicator. Inversions of the 3-month/10-year Treasury slope and the 3-month/3-month, 18-months forward slope both provide more timely recession signals than inversion of the 2-year/10-year Treasury slope. An inverted yield curve is a reliable equity bear market indicator. Even when it’s not signaling a recession, the yield curve’s movements offer some insight into equity returns as stocks have consistently performed better while it is flattening than they have when it is steepening. The 2-year/10-year Treasury slope embeds useful information for corporate bond excess returns. Corporates perform best when the slope is very steep and worst when it is very flat and/or inverted. Treasury securities generally outperform cash when the yield curve is either very steep or inverted. The one exception is the early-1980s when the Fed continued to tighten aggressively even after an inversion of the yield curve. Different Slopes Are Sending Different Signals Bottom Line: The overall message from the yield curve is that, while the economic recovery is no longer in its early stages, it is premature to talk about a recession. On a 6-to-12 month investment horizon, investors should overweight equities in multi-asset portfolios. Within US bond portfolios, investors should maintain a neutral allocation to investment grade corporate bonds and keep portfolio duration close to benchmark. Feature It’s a well-known maxim in macro-finance that an inverted yield curve signals a recession. While that adage embeds a lot of truth, it is also sufficiently vague that it raises more questions than it answers. How far in advance does an inverted yield curve signal a recession? What specific yield curve segment sends the most helpful signal? And most importantly, does the yield curve tell us anything useful about the future performance of financial assets? These sorts of questions are particularly relevant today as we observe some sections of the yield curve approaching inversion while others make new highs (Chart 1). Chart 1Different Slopes Are Sending Different Signals This Special Report explains how to think about the slope of the US Treasury curve as an indicator for the economy and financial markets. We first examine the yield curve’s empirical track record as a recession indicator. We then consider what the slope of the yield curve tells us about future equity, corporate bond and Treasury returns. The analysis presented in this report focuses on three different measures of the yield curve slope: The 2-year/10-year Treasury slope, the 3-month/10-year Treasury slope and the spread between the 3-month T-bill rate and the 3-month T-bill rate, 18 months forward. That last spread measure is less commonly cited, but Fed research has shown it to be a reliable predictor of recession.1 It was also recently highlighted by Fed Chair Jerome Powell.2 In the remainder of this report we will refer to the 3-month/3-month, 18-month forward spread as the “Fed Slope”. The Yield Curve & Recession Recession forecasting is a tricky business. It is often not so much a question of identifying “good” and “bad” recession indicators, but a question of balancing lead time and reliability. Recession indicators derived from financial market prices tend to offer greater advance warning of recession but also provide more false signals. On the flipside, indicators derived from macroeconomic data tend to give less lead time but with fewer false signals. Typically, the most useful recession indicators involve some combination of financial market and economic data. For example, a 2018 report from our US Investment Strategy service showed that a useful recession indicator can be created by combining the 3-month/10-year Treasury slope and the Conference Board’s Leading Economic Indicator.3 The Treasury slope’s reputation as an excellent recession indicator is justified because, despite it being derived from volatile financial market data, an inversion of the yield curve provides a very reliable recession signal. The 2-year/10-year Treasury slope has inverted in advance of 7 of the past 8 recessions and has not sent a false signal.4  The 3-month/10-year Treasury slope has done even better, calling 8 out of the past 8 recessions without a false signal. The Fed Slope, meanwhile, has also called 8 out of the past 8 recessions, but it sent one false signal in September 1998. There is room to quibble about the usefulness of the yield curve as a recession indicator in terms of lead time. The 2-year/10-year Treasury slope has, on average, inverted 15.9 months before the start of the next recession (Table 1). This inversion has always occurred before the first Fed rate cut of the cycle, and in all but one instance (1973-75), before the peak in the S&P 500. Table 1Lead Times For Yield Curve Segments, Equity Bear Markets And Fed Rate Cuts But while some advance warning is good, the 2-year/10-year slope probably gives too much lead time. For example, the 2-year/10-year slope inverted a full 24 months before the 2007-09 recession, but it would have been unwise to act on that information since the S&P 500 didn’t peak for another 22 months! The historical record shows that the 3-month/10-year Treasury curve and the Fed Slope offer more useful signals than the 2-year/10-year curve. On average, these curves provide less lead time than the 2-year/10-year slope but still generally provide advance warning of recession and stock market peaks. The recession signal from the 3-month/10-year slope has only missed the peak in the S&P 500 twice. The signal from the Fed Slope has only missed the stock market’s peak once, but it also sent one false signal. Synthesizing all this information, we conclude that the 3-month/10-year Treasury curve and the Fed Slope are both highly reliable recession indicators that typically provide more than enough advance warning for equity investors to adjust their positions. The main value of the 2-year/10-year Treasury curve is that its inversion warns that we may soon get a timelier signal from the 3-month/10-year Treasury slope and the Fed Slope. Looking at the present situation, the 2-year/10-year Treasury slope has flattened dramatically during the past few months, but at 18 bps it remains un-inverted. Meanwhile, the 3-month/10-year Treasury slope and the Fed Slope are both elevated at 195 bps and 255 bps, respectively. We can conclude from this that recession warnings are premature. We will become more concerned about an upcoming recession when the 3-month/10-year slope and the Fed Slope approach inversion. The Yield Curve & Equity Returns Identifying a recession and demarcating its beginning and ending dates may seem like a trivial exercise that has little practical import. Celebrated mutual fund manager Peter Lynch has repeatedly offered the opinion that any time an equity investor spends thinking about the economy is wasted time. We beg to differ. Equity bear markets reliably coincide with recessions (Chart 2) – since the late 1960s, only one recession has occurred without a bear market (the first leg of the Volcker double dip from January to July 1980) and only one bear market has occurred without a recession (October 1987’s Black Monday bear market) – and an asset allocator who reduced equity exposure upon receiving advance notice of recessions would have been in a position to generate significant alpha. Chart 2Recessions And Bear Markets Tend To Coincide The relationship between equity returns and the business cycle is not happenstance – variation in stock prices correlates closely with variation in corporate earnings and corporate earnings growth is a function of the business cycle. Equity prices, P, are simply the product of earnings per share, E, and the multiple investors are willing to pay for them, P/E: P = E x (P/E). If we hold somewhat fickle P/E multiples constant, stock prices will rise and fall with earnings. Given that earnings rarely decline outside of recessions (Chart 3), investors can expect equities to rise during expansions and decline during recessions. Chart 3Earnings Grow In Expansions And Fall In Recessions Earnings Declines Outside Of Recessions Are Rare Digging a little more deeply into the empirical record since consensus S&P 500 earnings estimates began to be compiled reinforces the earnings/returns link. With the exception of the first leg of the Volcker double dip recession in 1980, forward four-quarter earnings estimates have fallen in every recession and have contracted in the aggregate at an annualized 16% rate (Table 2). Multiples have expanded at a hearty 9% clip from the beginning to the end of recessions but have always declined, sometimes sharply, during them. Conversely, earnings estimates always grow heartily during expansions, while multiples tend to observe a fairly tight range. Multiples and stocks move ahead of the business cycle, consistently troughing before the end of a recession, but the 20-percentage-point expansion/recession disparity in annualized returns testifies to the yield curve’s utility as an investment leading indicator. Table 2When Earnings Fall, So Do Stocks The yield curve’s usefulness as a predictor of equity returns goes beyond recession signaling. Over the last half-century, the yield curve has tended to steepen and flatten in distinct phases. Defining a phase as a move of at least 200 basis points (bps) between the 3-month/10-year curve slope’s peak and trough, we count ten steepenings and nine flattenings since August 1969 (Chart 4). Chart 450 Years Of Steepening And Flattening After segmenting performance by slope increments in steepening (Table 3, top panel) and flattening (Table 3, middle panel) phases, we find a clear distinction. S&P 500 total returns tend to be much stronger when the yield curve is in a flattening phase than when it is steepening. In general, a steeper curve is better than a flatter (or inverted) one for equity returns but flattening dominates steepening in every segment but the current one (150-200 bps). The cheery news for investors concerned about an inverted yield curve’s effect on stocks is that the upcoming flattening increments between now and inversion have historically been favorable. Though we are tactically neutral equities, we recommend overweighting them in multi-asset portfolios over a cyclical 6-to-12 month timeframe. Table 3Stocks Like A Flattening Yield Curve The Yield Curve & Corporate Bond Returns This section of the report considers investment grade corporate bond returns in excess of a duration-matched position in US Treasuries and whether the slope of the Treasury curve can help us predict their magnitude. First, it’s important to point out that there is a lot of overlap between excess corporate bond returns and equity returns, but it is not complete (Chart 5). Corporates certainly tend to underperform duration-matched Treasuries during recessions and equity bear markets, but there have also been significant bouts of underperformance that fall outside of those periods. For example, corporate bond returns peaked well before equity returns in the late-1990s and corporates also underwent a severe selloff in 2014-15. Chart 5Investment Grade (IG) Corporate Bond Returns By Starting Slope Level And Trend That said, Table 4 shows that, as is the case with stocks, a strategy of reducing corporate bond exposure during recessions will profit over time. Corporate bonds have underperformed Treasuries by a cumulative 3.1% (annualized) during recessions since 1979 and have outperformed by 1.2% (annualized) in non-recessionary periods. Table 4Corporate Bond Performance In And Out Of Recessions The results in Table 4 suggest that investors should remain overweight corporate bonds versus Treasuries at least until the 3-month/10-year Treasury slope inverts. However, we think investors can perform even better if they pay attention to early warning signs from the 2-year/10-year Treasury slope. Table 5 shows historic 12-month corporate bond excess returns given different starting points for the 2-year/10-year slope. The starting points are also split depending on whether the 2-year/10-year slope was in a steepening or flattening trend at the time. Table 512-Month Investment Grade (IG) Corporate Bond Returns By Starting Slope Level And Trend The results presented in Table 5 show that the level of the slope matters much more than whether the curve is in a steepening or flattening trend. They also show that, in general, excess returns tend to be much higher when the slope is steep than when it is flat. We also see that the odds of corporate bonds outperforming duration-matched Treasuries on a 12-month horizon decline markedly for periods when the 2-year/10-year slope starts below 25 bps. At present, the 2-year/10-year Treasury slope is 18 bps, just below the 25-bps cutoff. Though we take this negative signal from the yield curve seriously, we also anticipate that peaking inflation will prevent the Fed from raising rates by 245 bps during the next 12 months, the pace that is currently discounted in the yield curve. If this view pans out it will likely lead to some modest 2/10 curve steepening and a relief rally in corporate spreads. To square the difference between the current negative message from the yield curve and our more optimistic macro view, we recommend a neutral allocation to investment grade corporate bonds within US fixed income portfolios. Though we will likely downgrade our recommended allocation if the 2-year/10-year slope continues to flatten and approaches inversion. The Yield Curve & Treasury Returns This section of the report considers US Treasury index returns in excess of a position in cash, a metric designed to proxy for the returns earned by varying a US bond portfolio’s average duration. Treasury outperformance of cash indicates that long duration positions are profiting while Treasury underperformance of cash indicates that short duration positions are in the green. The historical relationship between Treasury returns and the slope of the yield curve is heavily influenced by the early-1980s period when the Fed plunged the economy into a double-dip recession to contain spiraling inflation. Chart 6 shows that this early-1980s episode is the only one where Treasuries sold off steeply even after all three of our yield curves had inverted. Chart 6A Repeat Of The Early 1980s Episode Remains Unlikely In fact, if we look at the history of 12-month Treasury returns going back to 1973 split by the starting point for the slope (Tables 6A, 6B & 6C), we see that returns are worst after the curve is inverted and best when the curve is very steep. Table 6A12-Month Treasury Excess Returns* Given Different Starting Points For 2-Year / 10-Year Slope Since 1973 Table 6B12-Month Treasury Excess Returns* Given Different Starting Points For 3-Month / 10-Year Slope Since 1973 Table 6C12-Month Treasury Excess Returns* Given Different Starting Points For the Fed Slope** Since 1973 However, that picture changes if we start our historical sample in 1985 to exclude the early-1980s episode. Now, we see that Treasury returns tend to be high when the yield curve is very steep and when it is inverted (Tables 7A, 7B & 7C). The worst 12-month periods for Treasury returns are when the 2-year/10-year slope is between 75 bps and 100 bps, when the 3-month/10-year slope is between 50 bps and 75 bps and when the Fed Curve is between 0 bps and 25 bps. If we apply today’s situation to the post-1985 results shown in Tables 7A, 7B & 7C, we would conclude that the outlook for Treasury returns is very positive. The 3-month/10-year slope and Fed Curve are very steep, and the 2-year/10-year slope is in the 0 bps to 25 bps range. Of course, that message from the 2-year/10-year slope flips if viewed in the context of the post-1973 data shown in Table 6A. Table 7A12-Month Treasury Excess Returns* Given Different Starting Points For 2-Year / 10-Year Slope Since 1985 Table 7B12-Month Treasury Excess Returns* Given Different Starting Points For 3-Month / 10-Year Slope Since 1985 Table 7C12-Month Treasury Excess Returns* Given Different Starting Points For the Fed Slope** Since 1985 Our assessment is that the risk of a repeat of the early-1980s episode is still relatively small. Yes, inflation is extremely high, but it is likely to moderate naturally as we gain more distance from the pandemic. In that environment, the Fed will not feel the need to continue tightening aggressively even after all three segments of the yield curve have inverted. As such, we are inclined to view the message from the yield curve as positive for Treasury returns on a 12-month horizon, and we continue to advocate keeping average bond portfolio duration “at benchmark”.   Ryan Swift US Bond Strategist rswift@bcaresearch.com   Doug Peta, CFA Chief US Investment Strategist dougp@bcaresearch.com Footnotes 1 https://www.federalreserve.gov/econres/notes/feds-notes/dont-fear-the-yield-curve-20180628.htm 2 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-03-21/powell-says-look-at-short-term-yield-curve-for-recession-risk?sref=Ij5V3tFi 3 Please see US Investment Strategy Special Report, “How Much Longer Can The Bull Market Last?”, dated August 13, 2018. 4 We define an instance of “inversion” as a yield curve slope below zero for two consecutive months. Treasury Index Returns Spread Product Returns

Executive Summary Expansion In European Defense European yields have significant upside on a structural basis. European government spending will remain generous, which will boost domestic demand; meanwhile, lower global excess savings will lift the neutral rate of interest and structurally higher inflation will boost term premia. A short-term pullback in yields is nonetheless likely; however, it will not short-circuit the trend toward higher yields on a long-term basis. CYCLICAL INCEPTION DATE RETURN SINCE INCEPTION (%) COMMENT EQUITIES Favor European Aerospace & Defense Over European Benchmark 3/28/2022     Favor European Aerospace & Defense Over Other Industrials 3/28/2022     Bottom Line: Investors should maintain a below-benchmark duration in their European fixed-income portfolios. Higher yields driven by robust domestic demand and strong capex also boost the appeal of industrial, materials, and financials sectors. Aerospace and defense stocks are particularly appealing.     The economic impact of the war in Ukraine continues to drive the day-to-day fluctuations of the market; however, investors cannot ignore the long-term trends in the economy and markets. The direction of bond yields over the coming years is paramount among those questions. Does the recent rise in yields only reflect the current inflationary shock caused by both supply-chain impairments and commodity inflation—that is, is it finite? Or does that rise mirror structural forces and therefore have much further to run? We lean toward yields having more upside over the coming years, propelled higher by structural forces. As a result, we continue to recommend investors structurally overweight sectors that benefit from a rising yield environment, such as financials and industrials, while also favoring value over growth stocks. The defense sector is particularly attractive. Three Structural Forces Behind Higher Yields The current supply-chain disruptions and inflation crises have played a critical role in lifting European yields. However, a broader set of factors underpins our bearish bond view—namely, the lack of fiscal discipline accentuated by the consequences of the Ukrainian war, the likely move higher in the neutral rate of interest generated by lower savings, and the long-term uptrend in inflation. Profligate Governments Chart 1 Larger government deficits will contribute to higher European yields. Europe is not as fiscally conservative as it was before the COVID-19 crisis. Establishment politicians must fend off pressures caused by voters attracted to populist parties willing to spend more. Consequently, IMF estimates published prior to the Ukrainian war already tabulated that, for the next five years, Europe’s average structurally-adjusted budget deficit would be 2.4% of GDP wider than it was last decade (Chart 1). Chart 2Expanding Military Spending The Ukrainian crisis is also prompting a fiscal response that will last many years. Europe does not want to stand still in the face of the Russian threat. Today, Western Europe’s military spending amounts to 1.5% of GDP, or €170 billion. This is below NATO’s threshold of 2% of GDP. Rebuilding military capacity will take large investments. Thus, European nations are likely to move toward that target and even go beyond. Conservatively, if we assume that military spending hits 2% of GDP by the end of the decade, it will rise above €300 billion (Chart 2). Weaning Europe off Russian energy will also prevent a significant fiscal retrenchment. This effort will take two dimensions. The first initiative will be to build infrastructures to receive more LNG from the rest of the world to limit Russian intake. Constructing regasification and storage facilities as well as re-directing pipeline networks be costly and require additional CAPEX over the coming years. The second initiative will be to double-up on green initiatives to decrease the need for fossil fuel. The NGEU funds are already tackling this strategic goal. Nonetheless, the more than €100 billion reserved for renewable energy and energy preservation initiatives was only designed to kick-start hitting the EU’s CO2 emission target for 2050. Accelerating this process not only helps cutting the dependence on Russian energy, but it is also popular with voters. The path of least resistance is to invest in that sphere and to increase such investment beyond the current sums from the NGEU program. The last fiscal push is likely to be more temporary. The UN estimates that four million refugees have left Ukraine, with the vast majority settling in the EU. Accommodating that many individuals will be costly and will add to government spending across the region. Even if mostly transitory, this spending will have an important impact on activity. Larger fiscal deficits push yields higher for two reasons. Greater sovereign issuance that does not reflect a negative shock to the private sector will need to offer higher rates of returns to attract investors. Moreover, greater government spending will boost aggregate demand, which increases money demand. As a result, the price of money will be higher than otherwise, which means that interest rates will rise—as will yields. Decreasing Global Excess Savings Decreasing global excess savings will put upward pressure on the global neutral rate of interest, a phenomenon Peter Berezin recently discussed in BCA’s Global Investment Strategy service. This process will be visible in Europe as well. The US will play an important role in the process of lifting global neutral rates because the dollar remains the foundation of the global financial system. Compared to last decade, the main drag on US savings is that household deleveraging is over. As households decreased their debt load following the global financial crisis, a large absorber of global savings vanished, putting downward pressure on the price of those savings. Today, US households enjoy strong net worth equal to 620% of GDP and have resumed accumulating debt (Chart 3). Consequently, the downward trend in US total private nonfinancial debt loads has ended. The US capex cycle is likely to experience a boost as well. As Peter highlighted, the US capital stock is ageing (Chart 4). Moreover, the past five years have witnessed three events that underscore the fragility of global supply-chains: a disruptive Sino-US trade war, a pandemic, and now a military conflict. This realization is causing firms to move from a “just-in-time” approach to managing supply-chains to a “just-in-case” one. The process of building redundancies and localized supply chains will add to capex for many years, pushing up ex-ante investments relative to savings, and thus, interest rates. Chart 3US Households Are Done Deleveraging Chart 4An Ageing US Capital Stock China’s current account surplus is also likely to decline. For the past two decades, China has been one of the largest providers of savings to the global economy. This is a result of an annual current account surplus that first averaged $150 billion per year from 2000 to 2010 and then $180 billion from 2010 to 2020, and now stands at $316 billion. Looking ahead, China wants to use fiscal policy more aggressively to support demand, which often boosts imports without increasing exports. Also, more domestically-oriented supply chains around the world will limit the growth of Chinese exports. This combination will compress Chinese excess savings, which will place upward pressure on the global neutral rate of interest. Europe is not immune to declining savings. Over the past ten years, the Euro Area current account surplus has averaged €253 billion. Germany’s current account surplus stood at 7.4% of GDP before the pandemic. Those excess savings depressed global rates in general and European ones especially (Chart 5). As in the US, Europe’s capital stock is ageing and needs some upgrade (Chart 6). Moreover, greater government spending boosts aggregate demand. Because investment is a form of derived demand, stronger overall spending promotes capex to a greater extent. Thus, Europe’s public infrastructure push will lift private capex and curtail regional excess savings beyond the original drag from wider fiscal deficits. Additionally, the European population is getting older and will have to tap into their excess savings as they retire. This process will further diminish Europe’s current account surplus, that is, its excess savings. Chart 5Excess Savings Cap Relative Yields Chart 6An Ageing European Capital Stock Too Structurally Higher Inflation BCA believes that the current inflation surge is temporary and mostly reflects a mismatch between demand and supply. However, we also anticipate that, once this inflation climax dissipates, inflation will settle at a level higher than that prior to COVID-19 and will trend higher for the remainder of this decade. Labor markets will tighten going forward because policy rates remain well below neutral interest rates. Output gaps will close because of robust government spending and capex. This will keep wage growth elevated in the US and reanimate moribund salary gains in the Eurozone (Chart 7). This process, especially when combined with less efficient global supply chains and lower excess savings (which may also be thought of as deficient demand), will maintain inflation at a higher level than in the past two decades. Higher inflation will lift yields for two main reasons. First, investors will require both greater long-term inflation compensation and higher policy rates than in the past. Second, higher inflation often generates greater economic volatility and policy uncertainty, which means that today’s minimal term premia will increase over time (Chart 8). Together, these forces will create a lasting upward drift in yields. Chart 7European Wages Will Eventually Revive Chart 8Term Premia Won't Stay This Low Bottom Line: European yields will sport a structural uptrend for the remainder of the decade. Three forces support this assertion. First, European government spending will remain generous, supported by infrastructure and military spending. Second, global excess savings will recede as US consumer deleveraging ends, global capex rises, and the Chinese current account surplus narrows. Europe will mimic this process in response to an ageing population, greater government spending, and capex. Finally, inflation is on a structural uptrend, which will warrant higher term premia across the world. Not A Riskless View There are two main risks to this view, one in the near-term and one more structural. The near-term risk is the most pertinent for investors right now. Global yields may have embarked on a structural upward path, but a temporary pullback is becoming likely. As Chart 9 highlights, the expected twelve-month change in the US policy rate is at the upper limit of its range of the past three decades. Historically, when the discounter attains such a lofty level, a retrenchment in Treasury yields ensues, since investors have already discounted a significant degree of tightening. The same is true in Europe, where the ECB discounter is also consistent with a temporary pullback in German 10-year yields (Chart 10). Chart 9Discounters Point To A Treasury Rally... Chart 10... And A Bund Rally Chart 11A Mixed Message Investor positioning confirms the increasing tactical odds of a yield correction. The BCA Composite Technical Indicator for bonds is massively oversold, which often anticipates a bond rally (Chart 11). This echoes the signals from the JP Morgan surveys that highlight the very low portfolio duration of the bank’s clients. However, the BCA Bond Valuation Index suggests that bonds remain expensive. Together, these divergent messages point toward a temporary bond rally, not a permanent one. The longer-term risk is regularly highlighted by Dhaval Joshi in BCA’s Counterpoint service. Dhaval often shows that the stock of global real estate assets has hit $300 trillion or 330% of global GDP. Real estate is a highly levered asset class and global cap rates have collapsed with global bond yields. With little valuation cushion, real estate prices could become very vulnerable to higher yields. Nevertheless, real estate is also a real asset that produces an inflation hedge. Moreover, rental income follows global household income, and stronger aggregate demand will likely lift median household income especially in an environment in which globalization has reached its apex and populism remains a constant threat. Bottom Line: Global investor positioning has become stretched; therefore, a near-term pullback in yield is very likely, especially as central bank expectations have become aggressive. Nonetheless, a bond rally is unlikely to be durable in an environment in which bonds are expensive and in which growth and inflation will remain more robust than they were last decade. A greater long-term risk stems from expensive global real estate markets. However, real estate is sensitive to global economic activity and inflation, which should allow this asset class ultimately to weather higher yields. Investment Conclusions An environment in which yields rise will inflict additional damage on global bond portfolios. This is especially true in inflation-adjusted terms, since real yields stand at a paltry -0.76% in the US and -2.5% in Germany. Hence, we continue to recommend investors maintain a structural below-benchmark duration bias in their portfolios. Nonetheless, investors with enough flexibility in their investment mandate should take advantage of the expected near-term pullback in yields. Those without this flexibility should use the pullback as an opportunity to shorten their portfolio duration. Higher yields will also prevent strong multiple expansion from taking place; hence, the broad stock market will also offer paltry long-term real returns. Another implication of rising yields, especially if they reflect stronger growth and rising neutral interest rates, is to underweight growth stocks relative to value stocks (Chart 12). Growth stocks are expensive and very vulnerable to the pull on discount rates that follows rising risk-free rates. Meanwhile, stronger economic activity driven by infrastructure spending and capex will help the bottom line of industrial and material firms. Financials will also benefit. Higher yields help this sector and robust capex also boosts loan growth, which will generate a significant tailwind for banking revenues. Hence, rising yields will boost the attractiveness of banks, especially after they have become significantly cheaper because of the Ukrainian war (Chart 13). Chart 12Favor Value Over Growth Chart 13Bank Remain Attractive Related Report  European Investment StrategyFallout From Ukraine Finally, four weeks ago, we highlighted that defense stocks were particularly appealing in today’s context. The re-armament of Europe in response to secular tensions with Russia is an obvious tailwind for this sector. However, it is not the only one. A long-term theme of BCA’s Geopolitical Strategy service is the expanding multipolarity of the world.  The end of an era dominated by a single hegemon (the US) causes a rise in geopolitical instability and tensions. The resulting increase in conflict will invite a pickup in global military spending. Chart 14Defense Will Outshine The Rest European defense and aerospace stocks are expensive, with a forward P/E ratio approaching the top-end of their range relative to the broad market and other industrials. However, their relative earnings are also depressed following the collapse in airplane sales caused by the pandemic. Our bet on the sector is that its earnings will outperform the broad market as well as other industrials because of the global trend toward military buildup. As relative earnings recover their pandemic-induced swoon, so will relative equity prices (Chart 14). Bottom Line: Higher yields warrant a structural below-benchmark duration in European fixed-income portfolios, even if a near-term yield pullback is likely. As a corollary, value stocks will outperform growth stocks while industrials, materials, and financials will also beat a broad market whose long-term real returns will be poor. Within the industrial complex, aerospace and defense equities are particularly appealing because a global military buildup will boost their earnings prospects durably.   Mathieu Savary, Chief European Strategist Mathieu@bcaresearch.com   Tactical Recommendations Cyclical Recommendations Structural Recommendations Closed Trades

Executive Summary Petrocurrencies Have Lagged Terms Of Trade Petrocurrencies have lagged the surge in crude prices. This has been specific to the currency space since energy stocks have been in an epic bull market.Both cyclical and structural factors explain this conundrum.Cyclically, rising interest rate expectations in the US have dwarfed the terms-of-trade boost that the CAD, NOK, MXN, COP and even BRL typically enjoy (Feature Chart).Structurally, the US is now the biggest oil producer in the world (and a net exporter of natural gas). This has permanently shifted the relationship between the foreign exchange of traditional oil producers and the US dollar.Oil prices are overbought and vulnerable tactically to any resolution in the Russo-Ukrainian conflict. That said, they are likely to remain well bid over a medium-term horizon, ultimately supporting petrocurrencies.Petrocurrencies also offer a significant valuation cushion and carry relative to the US dollar, making them attractive for longer-term investors.Tactically, the currencies of oil producers relative to consumers could mean revert. It also suggests the Japanese yen, which is under pressure from rising energy imports, could find some footing, even as oil prices remain volatile.RECOMMENDATIONINCEPTION LEVELINCEPTION DATERETURNShort NOK/SEK1.112022-03-24-Bottom Line: Given our thesis of lower oil prices in the near term, but firmer prices in the medium term, we will be selling a basket of oil producers relative to oil consumers, with the aim of reversing that trade from lower levels.FeatureOil price volatility is once again dominating global market action. After hitting a low of close to $96/barrel on March 16th, Brent crude is once again at $120 as we go to press. Over the last two years, Brent crude has been as cheap as $16, and as expensive as $140. Energy stocks (and their respective bourses) have been the proximate winner from rising oil prices (Chart 1).Related ReportForeign Exchange StrategyWhat Next For The RMB?In foreign exchange markets, the currencies of commodity-producing countries have surprisingly lagged the improvement in oil prices (Chart 2). Historically, higher oil prices have had a profound impact on the external balance of oil producing versus consuming countries in general and petrocurrencies in particular. Chart 1Energy Stocks Have Tracked Forward Oil Prices  Chart 2Petrocurrencies Have Lagged Oil Prices Based on the observation above, this report addresses three key questions:Are there cyclical factors depressing the performance of petrocurrencies?Are there structural factors that have changed the relationship of these currencies with the US dollar?What is the outlook for oil, and the impact on short term versus longer-term currency strategy?We will begin our discussion with the outlook for oil.Russia, Oil, And PetrocurrenciesA high-level forecast from our Commodity & Energy Strategy colleagues calls for oil prices to average $93 per barrel this year and next.1 The deduction from this forecast is that we could see spot prices head lower from current levels this year but remain firm in 2023. From our perspective, there are a few factors that support this view:Forward prices tend to move in tandem with the spot fixing (Chart 3), but recently have also been a fair predictor of where current prices will settle over the medium term. Forward oil prices are trading at a significant discount to spot, suggesting some measure of mean reversion (Chart 4). Chart 3Forward And Spot Oil Prices Move Together  Chart 4The Oil Curve And Spot Prices There is a significant geopolitical risk premium embedded in oil prices. According to the New York Federal Reserve model, the demand/supply balance would have caused oil prices to fall between February 11 and February 25 this year. They however rose. This geopolitical risk premium has surely increased since then (Chart 5).Chart 5Oil Prices Embed A Significant Geopolitical Risk Premium Russian crude is trading at a sizeable discount compared to other benchmarks. This means that the incentive for substitution has risen significantly. Our Chief Commodity expert, Robert Ryan, noted on BLU today that intake from India is rising. This is helping put a floor on the Russian URAL/Brent discount blend at around $30 (Chart 6). Oil is fungible, and seaborne crude can be rerouted from unwilling buyers to satiate demand in starved markets.A fortnight ago, we noted how the US sanctions on Russia could shift the foreign exchange landscape, especially vis-à-vis the RMB. Specifically, RMB-denominated trade in oil is likely to increase significantly going forward. China has massively increased the number of bilateral swap lines it has with foreign countries, while stabilizing the RMB versus the US dollar.2Finally, smaller open economies such as Canada, Norway and even Mexico are opening the oil spigots (Chart 7). While individually these countries cannot fill any potential gap in Russian production, collectively they could help in the redistribution of oil supplies. Chart 6Russian Oil Is Selling At A Discount  Chart 7Small Oil Producers Will Benefit From High Prices The observations above suggest that the currencies of small oil-producing nations are likely to benefit in the medium term from a redistribution in oil demand. Remarkably, there has been little demand destruction yet from the rise in prices, according to the New York Fed. This suggests that as the global economy reopens, and the demand/supply balance tightens, longer-term oil prices will remain well bid.The key risk in the short term is the geopolitical risk premium embedded in oil prices fades, especially given the potential that Europe, China, and India continue to buy Russian supplies. We have been playing this very volatile theme via a short NOK/SEK position. We are stopped out this week for a modest profit and are reinitiating the trade if NOK/SEK hits 1.11.On The Underperformance Of Petrocurrencies? Chart 8Petrocurrencies Have Lagged Terms Of Trade The more important question is why the currencies of oil producers like the CAD, NOK, MXN or even BRL have not kept pace with oil prices as they historically have. As our feature chart shows (Chart 8), petrocurrencies have severely lagged the improvement in their terms of trade. This has been driven by both cyclical and structural factors.Cyclically, the underlying driver of FX in recent quarters has been the nominal interest rate spread between the US and its G10 counterparts. We have written at length on this topic, and on why we think there is a big mispricing in market behavior in our report – “The Biggest Macro Question By FX Investors Could Potentially Be The Least Relevant.” In a nutshell, two-year yields in the G10 have been lagging US rates, despite other central banks being ahead of the curve in hiking interest rates. This means that rising interest rate expectations in the US have dwarfed the terms of trade boost that the CAD, NOK, MXN, COP and even BRL typically enjoy.Structurally, the US is now the biggest oil producer in the world (Chart 9). This means the CAD/USD and NOK/USD exchange rates are experiencing a tectonic shift on a terms-of-trade basis. In 2010, the US accounted for only about 6% of global crude output. Collectively, Canada, Norway, and Mexico shared about 10% of global oil production. The elephant in the room was OPEC, with a market share just north of 40%. Today, the US produces over 14%, with Russia and Saudi Arabia around 13% each, the US having grabbed market share from many other countries. Chart 9The US Dominates Oil Production  Chart 10The US Dollar Is Becoming Increasingly Correlated To Oil As a result of this shift, the positive correlation between petrocurrencies and oil has gradually eroded. Measured statistically, the dollar had a near-perfect negative correlation with oil around the time US production was about to take off. Since then, that correlation has risen from around -0.9 to around -0.2 (Chart 10).A Few Trade IdeasThe analysis above suggests a few trade ideas are likely to generate alpha over the medium term:Long Oil Producers Versus Oil Consumers: This trade will suffer in the near term as oil prices correct but benefit from a relatively tighter market over a longer horizon. It will also benefit from the positive carry that many oil producers provide (Chart 11). We will go long a currency basket of the CAD, NOK, MXN, BRL, and COP versus the euro at 5% below current levels.Chart 11Real Rates Are High Amongst Petrocurrencies Sell CAD/NOK As A Trade: Norway is at the epicenter of the likely redistribution that will occur with a Russian blockade of crude, while Canada is further away from it. Terms of trade in Norway are doing much better than a relative measure in Canada (Chart 12). The discount between Western Canadian Select crude oil and Brent has also widened, which has historically heralded a lower CAD/NOK exchange rate. Chart 12CAD/NOK And Terms Of Trade Follow The Money: Oil now trades above the cash costs for many oil-producing countries. This means the incentive to boost production, especially when demand recovers, is quite high. This incentivizes players with strong balance sheets to keep the taps open. This could be a particular longer-term boon for the Canadian dollar which is seeing massive portfolio inflows (Chart 13). Chart 13Canadian Oil Export Boom And Portfolio Flows On The Yen (And Euro): Rising oil prices have been a death knell for the yen which is trading in lockstep with spot prices. Ditto for the euro. However, the yen benefits from very cheap valuations and extremely depressed sentiment. Any temporary reversal in oil prices will boost the yen (Chart 14). In our trading book, we were stopped out of a short CHF/JPY position last Friday, and we will look to reinitiate this trade in the coming days.  Chart 14The Yen And Oil Prices  Chester NtoniforForeign Exchange Strategistchestern@bcaresearch.comFootnotes1 Please see Commodity & Energy Strategy Weekly Report, “Uncertainty Tightens Oil Supply”, dated March 17, 2022.2 Please see Foreign Exchange Strategy Special Report, “What Next For The RMB?”, dated March 11, 2022.Trades & ForecastsStrategic ViewTactical Holdings (0-6 months)Limit OrdersForecast Summary