Geopolitics

Please note that yesterday we published Special Report titled Do Not Overlook China’s Innovation Drive. Please click on it to access it. Today, we publish analysis on Brazil and Ukraine.   Chart I-1Brazilian Share Prices And Commodity Prices Move In Tandem A FOMO (fear-of-missing-out) mania has pushed equity prices higher around the world. Brazilian stocks, currency and credit markets, likewise, have been staging a rebound. There is evidence that in Brazil equity purchases by local investors have been driving up share prices.1 The absolute performance of Brazilian share prices and the exchange rate trend will likely depend on commodities prices and a global rally in risk assets (Chart I-1). In relative terms, Brazilian financial markets will underperform their EM counterparts because of the following: Brazil is on track for its worst economic contraction in the past century following the deep recession of 2014-2016 (Chart I-2). This is the first nominal GDP contraction in Brazil. Growth was feeble even before the pandemic struck, but the COVID-19 lockdowns were the last nail in the coffin for the economy. Given that Brazil has not been able to control the spread of the virus – having hit another high in daily new infections last Friday – major cities will be forced to maintain social distancing measures for longer, delaying a recovery in consumer and business confidence. Chart I-2The Level Of Economic Activity In Real And Nominal Terms Table I-1Brazil's Fiscal Package Is The Largest In The Region   While Brazil has deployed the largest COVID-19 fiscal package in the region (Table I-1), its economic recovery will lag behind the majority of EM and DM countries. State-sponsored loans have not been reaching small and micro businesses, which employ over half of the working force. Moreover, informal workers amount to about 20% of the country’s total population, and they also have not been receiving any economic benefits other than a $120 US dollar monthly stipend. Household income growth was subdued during the 2017-2019 recovery. To support their living standards, families were aggressively borrowing before the pandemic (Chart I-3, top panel). Now, with their income contracting and household debt servicing costs above 20% of disposable income, consumer loan defaults will mushroom (Chart I-3, bottom panel). Chart I-4 shows that non-performing loans (NPL) for households are rising as a share of total consumer loans. Chart I-3Household Income, Credit And Debt Service Chart I-4Mushrooming Consumer Delinquencies   The private banks’ NPL provisions are set to surge due to rising defaults. Consumer loans make up 53% of private banks’ non-earmarked (non state-directed) lending. Chart I-5 shows that bank share prices are highly correlated with the annual change in provisions (shown inverted). Hence, the further rise in provisions will continue undermining bank share prices. We published a Special Report on Brazilian banks on March 31 and their outlook remains dismal. Besides, facing high credit risks, private banks have tightened credit standards and loan origination is plummeting, further hurting the economy. The sheer size of the fiscal stimulus and the historic nominal GDP contraction will push the gross public debt-to-GDP ratio well above 100% by end-2020. As discussed in our previous reports,2 and provided local currency interest rates remain above nominal GDP growth, public debt is on an unsustainable trajectory (Chart I-6). Chart I-5Do Not Chase Brazilian Bank Stocks Chart I-6Government Bond Yields Are Well Above Nominal GDP Growth   Chart I-7The Social Security Deficit Is Widening The only way to stabilize the public debt-to-GDP ratio in Brazil is via the central bank conducting substantial quantitative easing, i.e. monetary authorities purchasing local government bonds. This will push local bond yields much lower and over time boost nominal GDP growth. With interest rate on government debt below nominal GDP growth over several years, the condition of public debt sustainability will be achieved. However, this amounts to monetization of public debt and, if carried on a large scale, it will suffocate the exchange rate – the currency would depreciate a lot. Furthermore, the projected BRL 800 billion (11% of GDP) in savings from the infamous pension reform will be impossible to achieve. Chart I-7 shows that the social security deficit has widened since March due to the shortfall in revenues. Given social security revenues are derived from taxes on workers and businesses, this deficit will continue to increase as employment and wages collapse while pension payouts remain fixed. Finally, the political situation is in disarray and a presidential impeachment might be inevitable. President Bolsonaro has become even more radical and is in conflict with various branches of power. Meanwhile, corruption and electoral fraud investigations against him and his allies continue to develop. The key risk to our negative view is as follows: One could argue that investors have lost faith in the Bolsonaro administration and are actually looking forward to his removal from office. Hence, the escalating political crisis culminating in Bolsonaro’s impeachment would be bullish for financial markets. This is a valid perspective given Vice-president Mourão – who has the backing of the army and adheres to a more centrist view on a wide range of issues - would assume the presidency in the case of impeachment. He would maintain orthodox economic policies and cooperate with Congress. This kind of thinking from investors might be taking its cues from the political dynamics and market actions in early 2016, when Brazilian markets bottomed seven months before then President Dilma Rousseff was impeached. Brazil is on track for its worst economic contraction in the past century following the deep recession of 2014-2016. In addition, the long-term political outlook for Brazil might be turning positive. The quite popular ex-Justice Minister Sergio Moro hinted last week that he could run in the 2022 presidential race. While he did not explicitly announce his candidacy, he stated that he wants to “participate” in the public debate by presenting a pro-market and anti-corruption alternative to Bolsonaro. If Moro runs, he will likely win given his enormous popularity. His victory will be accordingly cheered by international and domestic investors as he would run on a platform of structural reforms. Chart I-8The Brazilian Real Is Only Modestly Cheap Nevertheless, in the near term Bolsonaro will try to maintain his grip on power as long as he can. Foreseeing the risk of impeachment, he has strengthened his ties with the big coalition of small centrist parties in Congress. For now, it is not clear if Congress will vote for his removal. Importantly, the more radical and autocratic Bolsonaro becomes in a bid to save his presidency, the higher the odds of Economy Minister Paulo Guedes resigning. This was the case with the Ministers of Health and Justice and the Secretary of the Treasury. The latter was a key figure in drafting economic reforms. If Guedes resigns, it will send shockwaves throughout the nation’s financial markets. Bottom Line: Continue underweighting Brazilian equities and fixed income within their respective EM universes. We took profits on our short BRL/long USD position on June 4th due to tactical considerations. Investors should consider shorting the BRL again. The BRL is somewhat but not very cheap (Chart I-8). Juan Egaña Research Associate juane@bcaresearch.com Arthur Budaghyan Chief Emerging Markets Strategist arthurb@bcaresearch.com Ukraine: An Opportunity In Bonds Is Still Present Investors should stay long local currency government bonds and continue overweighting the nation’s sovereign credit within the EM sovereign credit universe. Ukraine is pursuing prudent fiscal policy under the auspices of the IMF. With the government refraining from announcing a large-scale fiscal spending package amid the COVID-19 outbreak, its fiscal overall and primary deficits will widen to 8% and 4% of GDP, respectively. In particular, the increase in healthcare and social spending will be partially offset by both a reduction in discretionary spending and a cap on public wages. Such a conservative policy approach is negative for growth but will result in lower inflation and a stable exchange rate. Critically, a prudent fiscal policy will allow the central bank to cut interest rates. Both headline and core consumer price inflation are well below the lower end of the central bank’s target band (Chart II-1). Nominal wage growth is heading toward zero and will probably deflate by the end of this year (Chart II-2). Falling domestic demand will ensure that any rise in inflation due to currency depreciation will be modest. Chart II-1Inflation Is Undershooting Chart II-2Wage Growth Is Subdued!   As a result of considerable disinflation, real interest rates are still very high. Elevated real rates warrant large interest rate cuts by the central bank. Deflated by core consumer inflation, the real policy rate is 8% and the real lending rate is 12% for companies and over 30% for consumer credit (Chart II-3). A conservative policy approach is negative for growth but will result in lower inflation and a stable exchange rate. High real rates will entice foreign portfolio capital. Chart II-4 demonstrates that foreign investors have reduced their holdings of local bonds from $5.2 billion at the end of 2019 to $3.75 billion currently. Given the very low real rates worldwide, Ukraine is one of few markets offering high real rates with decent macro policies, at least in the medium term. Chart II-3Elevated Real Rates Warrant More Rate Cuts By CB Chart II-4Foreign Inflows Could Resume   With regard to the balance of payments, the recently announced $5 billion IMF loan should help ease short-term funding for the country. The 18-month arrangement will provide the immediate disbursement of $2.1 billion with a second disbursement of $0.7 billion expected by the end of September after the IMF program review. Importantly, plummeting imports and relatively resilient exports will narrow the current account deficit (Chart II-5). Exports should remain supported by food exports, which represents close to 40% of overall exports. Besides, the central bank also carries $25 billion in foreign exchange reserves, which compares with $18 billion in foreign funding requirements for 2020 (Chart II-6). So far, the central bank has refrained from selling foreign exchange reserves but might do so if the currency depreciates significantly. Chart II-5Current Account Will Balance Soon Chart II-6Foreign Funding Requirements Are Covered By FX Reserves   Bottom Line: We continue to recommend holding 5-year local currency government bonds currently yielding 11%. Even though moderate currency depreciation cannot be ruled out, on a total return basis domestic bonds will deliver decent returns to foreign investors in the next 6-12 months.  EM fixed income investors should continue overweighting domestic bonds and sovereign US dollar credit within respective EM portfolios. Andrija Vesic Associate Editor andrijav@bcaresearch.com     Footnotes 1     Investors ignore triple crisis and bet on equities 2     Please see Emerging Markets Strategy Countries In-Depth "Brazil: Deflationary Pressures Warrant A Weaker BRL," dated November 28, 2019 available at ems.bcaresearch.com Please see Emerging Markets Strategy Countries In-Depth "Brazil: Just Above "Stall Speed"," dated September 27, 2019 available at ems.bcaresearch.com   Equities Recommendations Currencies, Credit And Fixed-Income Recommendations

Bank Credit Analyst

Highlights Economic shocks in recent decades have led to surges in nationalism and the COVID-19 crisis is unlikely to be different. Nationalism adds to the structural challenges facing globalization, which is already in retreat. Investors face at least a 35% chance that President Trump will be reelected and energize a nationalist and protectionist agenda that is globally disruptive. China is also indulging in nationalism as trend growth slows, raising the probability of a clash with the US even if Trump does not win. US-China economic decoupling will present opportunities as well as risks – primarily for India and Southeast Asia. Feature Since the Great Recession, investors have watched the US dollar and US equities outperform their peers in the face of a destabilizing world order (Chart II-1). Chart II-1US Outperformance Amid Global Disorder Global and American economic policy uncertainty has surged to the highest levels on record. Investors face political and geopolitical power struggles, trade wars, a global pandemic and recession, and social unrest.  How will these risks shape up in the wake of COVID-19? First, massive monetary and fiscal stimulus ensure a global recovery but they also remove some of the economic limitations on countries that are witnessing a surge in nationalism.  Second, nationalism creates a precarious environment for globalization – namely the wave of “hyper-globalization” since 2000. Nationalism and de-globalization do not depend on the United States alone but rather have shifted to the East, which means that geopolitical risks will remain elevated even if the US presidential election sees a restoration of the more dovish Democratic Party.  Economic Shocks Fuel Nationalism’s Revival Nationalism is the idea that the political state should be made up of a single ethnic or cultural community. While many disasters have resulted from this idea, it is responsible for the modern nation-state and it has enabled democracies to take shape across Europe, the Americas, and beyond. Industrialization is also more feasible under nationalism because cultural conformity helps labor competitiveness.1  At the end of the Cold War, transnational communist ideology collapsed and democratic liberalism grew complacent. Each successive economic shock or major crisis has led to a surge in nationalism to fill the ideological gaps that were exposed. Chart II-2The Resurgence Of Russian Nationalism Chart II-3USA: From Nationalism To Anti-Nationalism   For instance, various nationalists and populists emerged from the financial crises of the late 1990s. Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to restore Russia to greatness in its own and other peoples’ eyes (Chart II-2). Not every Russian adventure has mattered for investors, but taken together they have undermined the stability of the global system and raised barriers to exchange. The invasion of Crimea in 2014 and the interference in the US election in 2016 helped to fuel the rise in policy uncertainty, risk premiums in Russian assets, and safe havens over the past decade. The September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States created a surge in American nationalism (Chart II-3). This surge has since collapsed, but while it lasted the US destabilized the Middle East and provided Russia and China with the opportunity to pursue a nationalist path of their own. Investors who went long oil and short the US dollar at this time could have done worse. The 2008 crisis spawned new waves of nationalist feeling in countries such as China, Japan, the UK, and India (Chart II-4). Conservatives of the majority cultural group rose to power, including in China, where provincial grassroots members of the elite reasserted the Communist Party’s centrality. Japan and India became excellent equity investment opportunities in their respective spheres, while the UK and China saw their currencies weaken.  The rising number of wars and conflicts across the world since 2008 reflects the shift toward nationalism, whether among minority groups seeking autonomy or nation-states seeking living space (Chart II-5). Chart II-4Nationalist Trends Since The Great Recession Chart II-5World Conflicts Rise After Major Crises   COVID-19 is the latest economic shock that will feed a new round of nationalism. At least 750 million people are extremely vulnerable across the world, mostly concentrated in the shatter belt from Libya to Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, and India.2 Instability will generate emigration and conflict. Once again the global oil supply will be at risk from Middle Eastern instability and the dollar will eventually fall due to gargantuan budget and trade deficits. Today’s shock will differ, however, in the way it knocks against globalization, a process that has already begun to slow. Specifically, this crisis threatens to generate instability in East Asia – the workshop of the world – due to the strategic conflict between the US and China. This conflict will play out in the form of “proxy battles” in Greater China and the East Asian periphery. The dollar’s recent weakness is a telling sign of the future to come. In the short run, however, political and geopolitical risks are acute and will support safe havens. Globalization In Retreat Nationalism is not necessarily at odds with globalization. Historically there are many cases in which nationalism undergirds a foreign policy that favors trade and eschews military intervention. This is the default setting of maritime powers such as the British and Dutch. Prior to WWII it was the American setting, and after WWII it was the Japanese. Over the past thirty years, however, the rise of nationalism has generally worked against global trade, peace, and order. That’s because after WWII most of the world accepted internationalist ideals and institutions promoted by the United States that encouraged free markets and free trade. Serious challenges to that US-led system are necessarily challenges to global trade. This is true even if they originate in the United States. Globalization has occurred in waves continuously since the sixteenth century. It is not a light matter to suggest that it is experiencing a reversal. Yet the best historical evidence suggests that global imports, as a share of global output, have hit a major top (Chart II-6).3 The line in this chart will fall further in 2020. American household deleveraging, China’s secular slowdown, and the 2014 drop in oil and commodities have had a pervasive impact on the export contribution to global growth.   Chart II-6Globalization Hits A Major Top Chart II-7Both Goods And Services Face Headwinds The next upswing of the business cycle will prompt an increase in trade in 2021. Global fiscal stimulus this year amounts to 8% of GDP and counting. But will the import-to-GDP ratio surpass previous highs? Probably not anytime soon. It is impossible to recreate America’s consumption boom and China’s production boom of the 1980s-2000s with public debt alone. Global trend growth is slowing. Isn’t globalization proceeding in services, if not goods? The world is more interconnected than ever, with nearly half of the population using the Internet – almost 30% in Sub-Saharan Africa. One in every two people uses a smartphone. Eventually the pandemic will be mitigated and global travel will resume. Nevertheless, the global services trade is also facing headwinds. And it requires even more political will to break down barriers for services than it does for goods (Chart II-7). The desire of nations to control and patrol cyberspace has resulted in separate Internets for authoritarian states like Russia and China. Even democracies are turning to censorship and content controls to protect their ideologies.  Political demands to protect workers and industries are gaining ground. Policymakers in China and Russia have already shifted back toward import substitution; now the US and EU are joining them, at least when it comes to strategic sectors (health, defense). Nationalists and populists across the emerging world will follow their lead. Regional and wealth inequalities are driving populations to be more skeptical of globalization. GDP per capita has not grown as fast as GDP itself, a simple indication of how globalization does not benefit everyone equally even though it increases growth overall (Chart II-8). Inequality is a factor not only because of relatively well-off workers in the developed world who resent losing their job or earning less than their neighbors. Inequality is also rife in the developing world where opportunities to work, earn higher wages, borrow, enter markets, and innovate are lacking. Over the past decade, emerging countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, and South Africa have seen growing skepticism about whether foreign openness creates jobs or lifts wages.4  Immigration is probably the clearest indication of the break from globalization. The United States and especially the European Union have faced an influx of refugees and immigrants across their southern borders and have resorted to hard-nosed tactics to put a stop to it (Chart II-9). Chart II-8Global Inequality Fuels Protectionism Chart II-9US And EU Crack Down On Immigration   There is zero chance that these tough tactics will come to an end anytime soon in Europe, where the political establishment has discovered a winning combination with voters by promoting European integration yet tightening control of borders. This combination has kept populists at bay in France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Germany. A degree of nationalism has been co-opted by the transnational European project. In the US, extreme polarization could cause a major change in immigration policy, depending on the election later this year. But note that the Obama administration was relatively hawkish on the border and the next president will face sky-high unemployment, which discourages flinging open the gates.  Reduced immigration will weigh on potential GDP growth and drive up the wage bill for domestic corporations. If nationalism continues to rise and to hinder the movement of people, goods, capital, and ideas, then it will reduce the market’s expectations of future earnings. American Nationalism Still A Risk  The United States is experiencing a “Civil War Lite” that may take anywhere from one-to-five years to resolve. The November 3 presidential election will have a major impact on the direction of nationalism and globalization over the coming presidential term. If President Trump is reelected – which we peg at 35% odds – then American nationalism and protectionism will gain a new lease on life. Other nations will follow the US’s lead. If Trump fails, then nationalism will likely be driven by external forces, but protectionism will persist in some form. Chart II-10Trump Is Not Yet Down For The Count Investors should not write Trump off. If the election were held today, Trump would lose, but the election is still four months away. His national approval rating has troughed at a higher level than previous troughs. His disapproval rating has spiked but has not yet cleared its early 2019 peak (Chart II-10).5 This is despite an unprecedented deluge of bad news: universal condemnation from Democrats and the media, high-profile defections from fellow Republicans and cabinet members, stunning defeats at the Supreme Court, and scathing rebukes from top US army officers. If Trump’s odds are 35% then this translates to a 35% chance that the United States will continue pursuing globally disruptive “America First” foreign and trade policies in the 2020-24 period.    First Trump will attempt to pass a Reciprocal Trade Act to equalize tariffs with all trading partners. Assuming Democrats block it in the House of Representatives, he will still have sweeping executive authority to levy tariffs. He will launch the next round in the trade war with China to secure a “Phase Two” trade deal, which will be tougher because it will be focused on structural reforms. He could also open new fronts against the European Union, Mexico, and other trade surplus countries. By contrast, these risks will melt away if Biden is elected. Biden would restore the Obama administration’s approach of trade favoritism toward strategic allies and partners, such as Europe and the members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but only occasional use of tariffs. Biden would work with international organizations like the World Trade Organization. His foreign policy would also open up trade with pariah states like Iran, reducing the tail-risk of a war to almost zero.  Biden would be tougher on China than Presidents Obama or Bill Clinton, as the consensus in Washington is now hawkish and Biden would need to keep the blue-collar voters he won back from Trump. He may keep Trump’s tariffs in place as negotiating leverage. But he is less likely to expand these tariffs – and there is zero chance he will use them against Europe. At the same time, it will take a year or more to court the allies and put together a “coalition of the willing” to pressure China on structural reforms and liberalization. China would get a reprieve – and so would financial markets. Thus investors have a roughly 65% chance of seeing US policy “normalize” into an internationalist (not nationalist) approach that reduces the US contribution to trade policy uncertainty and geopolitical risk over the next few years at minimum. But there are still four months to go before the election; these odds can change, and equity market volatility will come first. Moreover a mellower US would still need to react to nationalism in Asia. European Nationalism Not A Risk (Yet) Chart II-11English Versus Scottish Nationalism European nationalism has reemerged in recent years but has greatly disappointed the prophets of doom who expected it to lead to the breakup of the European Union. The southern European states suffered the most from COVID-19 but many of them have made their decision regarding nationalism and the supra-national EU. Greece underwent a depression yet remained in the union. Italians could easily elect the right-wing anti-establishment League to head a government in the not-too-distant future. But there is no appetite for an Italian exit. Brexit is the grand exception. If Trump wins, then the UK and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will be seen as the vanguard of the revival of nationalism in the West. If Trump loses, English nationalism will appear an isolated case that is constrained by its own logic given the response of Scottish nationalism (Chart II-11). The trend in the British Isles would become increasingly remote from the trends in continental Europe and the United States. The majority of Europeans identify both as Europeans and as their home nationality, including majorities in countries like Greece, Italy, France, and Austria where visions of life outside the union are the most robust (Chart II-12). Even the Catalonians are focused on options other than independence, which has fallen to 36% support. Eastern European nationalists play a careful balancing game of posturing against Brussels yet never drifting so far as to let Russia devour them. Chart II-12European Nationalism Is Limited (For Now) Europeans have embraced the EU as a multi-ethnic confederation that requires dual allegiances and prioritizes the European project. COVID-19 has so far reinforced this trend, showing solidarity as the predominant force, and much more promptly than during the 2011 crisis. It will take a different kind of crisis to reverse this trend of deeper integration. European nationalists would benefit from another economic crash, a new refugee wave from the Middle East, or conflict with Turkish nationalism. The latter is already burning brightly and will eventually flame out, but not before causing a regional crisis of some kind. European policymakers are containing nationalism by co-opting some of its demands. The EU is taking steps to guard against globalization, particularly on immigration and Chinese mercantilism. The lack of nationalist uprisings in Europe do not overthrow the contention that globalization is slowing down. Europe can become more integrated at home while maintaining the higher barriers against globalization that it has always maintained relative to the UK and United States. Chinese Nationalism The Biggest Risk The nationalist risk to globalization is most significant in East Asia and the Pacific, where Chinese nationalism continues the ascent that began with the Great Recession. China’s slowdown in growth rates has weakened the Communist Party’s confidence in the long-term viability of single-party rule. The result has been a shift in the party line to promote ideology and quality of life improvements to compensate for slower income gains. Xi Jinping’s governing philosophy consists of nationalist territorial gains, promoting “the China Dream” for the middle class, and projecting ambitious goals of global influence by 2035 and 2049. The result has been a clash between mainland Chinese and peripheral Chinese territories – especially Hong Kong and Taiwan (Chart II-13). The turn away from Chinese identity in these areas runs up against their economic interest. It is largely a reaction to the surge in mainland nationalist sentiment, which cannot be observed directly due to the absence of reliable opinion polling. Chart II-13AChinese Nationalism On The Mainland, Anti-Nationalism In Periphery Chart II-13BChinese Nationalism On The Mainland, Anti-Nationalism In Periphery   The conflict over identity in Greater China is perhaps the world’s greatest geopolitical risk. While Hong Kong has no conceivable alternative to Beijing’s supremacy, Taiwan does. The US is interested in reviving its technological and defense relationship with Taiwan now that it seeks to counterbalance China. Chart II-14Taiwan: Epicenter Of US-China Cold War Beijing may be faced with a technology cordon imposed by the United States, and yet have the option of circumventing this cordon via Taiwan’s advanced semiconductor manufacturing. Taiwan’s “Silicon Shield” used to be its security guarantee. Now that the US is tightening export controls and sanctions on China, Beijing has a greater need to confiscate that shield. This makes Taiwan the epicenter of the US-China struggle, as we have highlighted since 2016. The risk of a fourth Taiwan Strait crisis is as pertinent in the short run as it is over the long run, given that the US and China have already intensified their saber-rattling in the Strait (Chart II-14), including in the wake of COVID-19 specifically. China’s secular slowdown is prompting it to encroach on the borders of all of its neighbors simultaneously, creating a nascent balance-of-power alliance ranging from India to Australia to Japan. If China fails to curb its nationalism, then eventually US political polarization will decline as the country unites in the face of a peer competitor. If American divisions persist, they could drive the US to instigate conflict with China. Thus a failure of either side to restrain itself is a major geopolitical risk. The US and China ultimately face mutually assured destruction in the event of conflict, but they can have a clash in the near term before they learn their limits. The Cold War provides many occasions of such a learning process – from the Berlin airlift to the Cuban missile crisis. Such crises typically present buying opportunities for financial markets, but the consequences could be more far reaching if the Asian manufacturing supply chain is permanently damaged or if the shifting of supply chains out of China is too rapid. Globalization will also suffer as a result of currency wars. The US has not been successful in driving the dollar down, a key demand of the US-China trade war. It is much harder to force China to reform its labor and wage policies than it is to force it to appreciate its currency. But unlike Japan in 1985, China will not commit to unilateral appreciation for fear of American economic sabotage.   Punitive measures will remain an American tool. Contrary to popular belief, the US is not attempting to eliminate its trade deficit. It is attempting to reduce overreliance on China. Status quo globalization is intolerable for US strategy. But autarky is intolerable for US corporations. The compromise is globalization-ex-China, i.e., economic decoupling. Investment Implications Chart II-15Favor International Stocks As Growth Revives US stock market’s capitalization now makes up 58% of global capitalization (Chart II-15), reflecting the strength and innovation of American companies as well as a worldwide flight to safety during a decade of rising policy uncertainty and geopolitical risk. The revival of global growth amid this year’s gargantuan stimulus will prompt a major rotation out of US equities and into international and emerging market equities over the long run. As mentioned, the US greenback would also trend downward. However, there will be little clarity on the pace of nationalism and the fate of globalization until the US election is decided. Moreover the fate of globalization does not depend entirely on the United States. It mostly depends on countries in the east – Russia, China, and India, all of which are increasingly nationalistic.  A miscalculation over Taiwan, North Korea, the East China Sea, the South China Sea, trade, or technology could ignite into tariffs, sanctions, boycotts, embargoes, saber-rattling, proxy battles, and potentially even direct conflict. These risks are elevated in the short run but will persist in the long run. As the US decouples from China it will have to deepen relations with other trading partners. The trade deficit will not go away but will be redistributed to Asian allies. Southeast Asian nations and India – whose own nationalism has created a shift in favor of economic development – will be the long-run beneficiaries. Matt Gertken  Vice President Geopolitical Strategist   Footnotes 1  Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1983). 2  Neli Esipova, Julie Ray, and Ying Han, “750 Million Struggling To Meet Basic Needs With No Safety Net,” Gallup News, June 16, 2020.  3  Christopher Chase-Dunn et al, “The Development of World-Systems,” Sociology of Development 1 (2015), pp. 149-172; and Chase-Dunn, Yukio Kawano, Benjamin Brewer, “Trade globalization since 1795: waves of integration in the world-system,” American Sociological Review 65 (2000), pp. 77-95.  4  Bruce Stokes, “Americans, Like Many In Other Advanced Economies, Not Convinced Of Trade’s Benefits,” September 26, 2018. 5  In other words, the mishandling of COVID-19 and the historic George Floyd protests of June 2020 have not taken as great of a toll on Trump’s national approval, thus far, as the Ukraine scandal last October, the government shutdown in January-February 2019, the near-failure to pass tax cuts in December 2017, or the Charlottesville incident in August 2017. This is surprising and points once more to Trump’s very solid political base, which could serve as a springboard for a comeback over the next four months.

Bank Credit Analyst

Highlights The cyclical rally in stocks is not over, but the S&P 500 will churn between 2800 and 3200 this summer. Supportive policy, robust household balance sheets and budding economic growth have put a floor under global bourses. Political risk, demanding valuations and COVID-related headlines are creating potent headwinds in the near term that must be resolved. During the ongoing flat but volatile performance of equities, investors should build short positions against government bonds and the dollar. Deep cyclicals, banks and Japanese equities offer opportunities to generate alpha. In the long term, structurally rising inflation will ensure that stocks outperform bonds, but commodities will beat them both. Feature Institutional investors still despise the equity market rebound that began on March 23. Relative to history, professional investors are heavily overweight cash, bonds and defensive sectors but they are underweight equities as an asset class and cyclical sectors specifically. Furthermore, the beta of global macro hedge funds to the stock market is in the bottom of its distribution, which indicates the funds’ low net exposure to equities. The attitude of market participants is understandable given that the economy is in tatters. According to the New York Fed Weekly Economic Index, Q2 GDP in the US will contract by 8.4% compared with last year. Industrial production is still 15.9% below its pre-pandemic high and the US unemployment rate stands at either 13.3% or 16.4%, depending how the BLS accounts for furloughed employees. Moreover, deflationary forces are building, which hurts profits. Despite these discouraging economic reports, the S&P 500 is trading only 7.9% below its February 19 all-time high and is displaying a demanding forward P/E ratio of 21.4. Stocks will continue to churn over the summer with little direction. Financial markets are forward looking and the collapse of risk asset prices in March forewarned of an economic calamity. Stimulus, liquidity conditions and an eventual recovery are creating strong tailwinds for stocks. However, demanding valuations, rising political risks and overbought short-term technicals argue for a correction. These forces will probably balance out each other in the coming months. Investors must be nimble. Buying beta is not enough; finding cheap assets levered to the nascent recovery will be a source of excess returns. Bonds are vulnerable to the recovery and purchasing deep cyclicals at the expense of defensives makes increasing sense. Japanese stocks offer another attractive opportunity. Five Pillars Behind Stocks… Our BCA Equity Scorecard remains in bullish territory despite the conflict between the sorry state of the global economy and the violence of the equity rally since late March (Chart I-1). Five forces support share prices. Chart I-1The Rally Is Underpinned The first pillar is extraordinarily accommodative liquidity conditions created by global central banks, which have aggressively slashed policy rates and allowed real interest rates to collapse. Additionally, forward guidance indicates that policy will remain easy for the foreseeable future. For example, the Federal Reserve does not anticipate tightening policy through 2022 and the Bank of Japan expects to stand pat until at least 2023. In response, the yield curve in advanced economies has started to steepen, which indicates that the policy easing is having a positive impact on the world’s economic outlook (Chart I-2). Various liquidity measures demonstrate the gush of high-powered money in the financial and economic system in the wake of monetary policy easing. Our US Financial Liquidity Index and dollar-based liquidity measure have skyrocketed. Historically, these two indicators forecast the direction of growth and the stock market (Chart I-3). Chart I-2The Yield Curve Likes What It Sees Chart I-3Exploding Liquidity Conditions   The second pillar is the greatest fiscal easing since World War II. The US government has increased spending by $2.9 trillion since March. House Democrats have passed an additional $3 trillion plan. Senate Republicans will not ratify the entire proposal, but our Geopolitical Strategy service expects them to concede to $2 trillion.1 Meanwhile, the White House is offering a further $1 trillion infrastructure program over five years. Details of the infrastructure plan are murky, but its existence confirms that fiscal profligacy is the new mantra in Washington and the federal deficit could reach 23% of GDP this year. Chart I-4Loosest Fiscal Policy Since WWII The list of new fiscal measures worldwide is long; the key point is that governments are injecting funds to lessen the COVID-19 recession pain on their respective populations and small businesses (Chart I-4). Excluding loans guarantees, even tight-fisted Germany has rolled out EUR 0.44 trillion in relief programs, amounting to 12.9% of GDP. Japan has announced JPY 63.5 trillion of “fresh water” stimulus so far, representing 11.4% of GDP. Loan guarantees administered by various governments along with the Fed’s Primary and Secondary Market Credit Facilities also limit how high business bankruptcies will climb. As we discussed last month, it is unlikely that countries will return to the level of spending and budget deficits that prevailed prior to COVID-19, even if the intensity of fiscal support declines from its current extreme.2 Voters in the West and emerging markets are fed up with the Washington Consensus of limited state intervention. Consequently, the median voter has pivoted to the left on economic matters, especially in Anglo-Saxon nations (Chart I-5).3 The fiscal laxity consistent with economic populism and dirigisme will boost aggregate demand for many years. The third supporting pillar is the private sector’s response to monetary and fiscal easing unleashed by global policymakers. Unlike in 2008, the amount of loans and commercial papers issued by US businesses is climbing, which indicates stronger market access than during the Great Financial Crisis (GFC). A consequence of the large uptick in credit growth has been an explosion in banking deposits. Given the surge in private-sector liquidity – not just base money – broad money creation has eclipsed that of the GFC (Chart I-6). Part of this money will seek higher returns than the -0.97% real short rate available to investors in the US (or -0.9% in Europe), a process that will bid up risk assets. Chart I-5The US Population's Shift To The Left Chart I-6The Private Sector's Liquidity Is Improving   The financial health of the US household sector is the fourth pillar buttressing stocks. Households entered the recession with debt equal to 99.4% of disposable income, the lowest share in 19 years. Moreover, debt servicing only represents 9.7% of disposable income, the lowest percentage of the past four decades. Along with generous support from the US government, the resilience created by strong balance sheets explains why delinquency rates remain muted despite a surge in unemployment (Table I-1).4 Moreover, the decline in household net worth pales in comparison with the GFC (Chart I-7). Hence, the wealth effect will not have the same deleterious impact on consumption as it did after 2008. In the wake of large fiscal transfers, the savings rate explosion to an all-time high of 32.9% is a blessing. The surge in savings is applying a powerful brake on 67.7% of the US economy, but its eventual decline will fuel a quick consumption recovery, a positive trend absent after the GFC. Table I-1Consumer Borrowers Are Hanging In There Chart I-7Smaller Hit To Net Worth Than The GFC     The final pillar is the path of the global business cycle. Important predictors of the US economy have improved. The June Philly Fed and Empire State surveys are gaining ground, thanks to their rebounding new orders and employment components. The Conference Board’s LEI is also climbing, even when its financial constituents are excluded.  Residential activity, which also leads the US business cycle, is sending positive signals. According to the June NAHB Housing market index, homebuilder confidence is quickly recouping lost ground and building permits are bottoming. These two series suggest that the contribution of housing to GDP growth will only expand. Household spending is showing promising growth as the economy re-opens. In May, US auto sales jumped 44.1% higher and retail sales (excluding autos) soared by 12.4%. Additionally, the retail sales control group5 has already recovered to its pre-pandemic levels. The healing labor market and the bounce in consumer confidence have fueled this record performance because they will prompt a normalization in the savings rate. Progress is also evident outside the US. The expectations component of the German IFO survey is rebounding vigorously, a good omen for European industrial production (Chart I-8). Similarly, the continued climb in China’s credit and fiscal impulse suggests that global industrial production will move higher. Finally, EM carry trades are recovering, which indicates that liquidity is seeping into corners of the global economy that contribute the most to capex (Chart I-9). Chart I-8European Hopes Chart I-9Positive Signals For Global Manufacturers     Against this backdrop, there is an increasing probability that analysts will upgrade their 2020 EPS estimates. The odds of upward revisions to 2021 and 2022 estimates (especially outside of the tech and healthcare sectors) are much more significant, especially because the historical pattern of deep recessions followed by sharp rebounds should repeat itself (Chart I-10). A strong recovery will ultimately foster risk-taking. Mechanically, higher expected cash flows and lower risk premia will remain tailwinds behind stocks. Chart I-10The Deeper The Fall, The Faster The Rebound … And Three Reasons To Worry The five pillars shoring up stocks face three powerful factors working at cross purposes against share prices. The first hurdle against stocks is that in aggregate, the S&P 500 is already discounting the coming economic recovery. In the US, the 12-month forward P/E ratio bounced from a low of 13.4 on March 23 to the current 21.4. Bidding up multiples to such heights in a short timeframe opens up the potential for investor disappointments with economic activity or earnings. Equally concerning, the global expectations component of the German ZEW survey has returned to near-record highs. The ZEW is a survey of financial professionals largely influenced by the performance of equities. In order for stocks to continue to rise, they will need an even greater global economic rebound than implied by the ZEW (Chart I-11). Chart I-11Stocks Already Know That IP Will Jump Back Political risk poses a second hurdle against stocks. As intense as it is today, policy uncertainty will not likely abate this summer, which will put upward pressure on the equity risk premium. According to BCA Research’s Geopolitical strategy service, the combination of elevated share prices and President Trump’s low approval rating will increase the prospect of erratic moves by the White House. A pitfall particularly under-appreciated by risk assets is a new round of tariffs in the Sino-US trade war.6 Another hazard is an escalation of tensions with the European Union. US domestic politics are also problematic. Fiscal stimulus has been a pillar for the market. However, as the economy recovers, politicians could let down their guard and resist passing new measures on the docket. This danger is self-limiting. If legislators delay voting on proposed laws, then the resulting drop in the market will put greater pressure on policymakers to continue to support the economy. Either way, this tug-of-war could easily cause some painful bouts of market volatility. Chart I-12How Long Will Stocks Ignore Politics? In recent months, the equity risk premium could ignore rising political risk as long as financial liquidity was expanding at an accelerating pace (Chart I-12). However, the bulk of monetary easing is over because the Fed, the ECB and the global central banks have already expended most of their ammunition. Moreover, the ECB, the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan and the Swiss National Bank have agreed to slow the pace at which they tap the Fed’s dollar swap line from daily to three times a week. This indicates that the private sector’s extreme appetite for liquidity has been satiated by the increase in base money since March 19. Thus, the expansion of liquidity will decelerate, even if its level remains plentiful. Overlooking political uncertainty will become harder after the second derivative of liquidity turns negative. The third hurdle against the stock market is the evolution of COVID-19. A second wave of infection has started in many countries and it will only continue to escalate as economies re-open, loosen social distancing rules and test more potential cases. Investors will be rattled by headlines such as the resumption of lockdowns in Beijing and mounting new cases in the southern US.  Chart I-13A Different Wave BCA’s base case is that a second wave of infections will not result in large-scale lockdowns that paralyzed the global economy in Q1 and Q2. Importantly, the number of new deaths is lagging the spread of recorded new infections (Chart 1-13). This dichotomy highlights better testing, our improved understanding of the disease and our greater capacity to protect vulnerable individuals. A Summer Of Discontent The S&P 500 and global equities will face a summer of directionless gyrations with elevated volatility. Before we can escape this pattern, the technical froth that has engulfed the market must dissipate. Our Tactical Strength Indicator is massively overbought and is consistent with a period of consolidation. (Chart I-14). The same is true of short-term breadth. The proportion of NYSE stocks trading above their 10-week moving average is close to its highest level in the past 20 years, which indicates that meaningful equity gains are doubtful in the coming months. (Chart I-14, bottom panel). A correction should not morph into a renewed bear market because the pillars behind stocks are too strong. Nonetheless, the S&P 500 may retest the 2800-2900 zone during the summer. On the upside, it will be capped near 3200 during that same period. A resolution of the political risks surrounding the market is needed to settle the churning pattern. Another factor will be the progressive normalization of our tactical indicators after an extended period of sideways trading. Finally, continued progress on the treatment of COVID-19 (not necessarily a vaccine) and the formulation of a coherent health policy for the fall will create the impetus for higher share prices later this year. How To Profit When Stocks Churn A strategy most likely to generate the highest reward-to-risk ratio will be to focus on assets and sectors that have not yet fully priced in the upcoming global economic recovery, unlike the broad stock market. The bond market fits within this strategy. G-7 and US yields remain extremely expensive (Chart I-15). Additionally, according to our Composite Technical Indicator, Treasuries are losing momentum (see Section III, page 41). This valuation and technical backdrop renders government bonds vulnerable to both a strong economy and an upward reassessment of the outlook for inflation. Chart I-14A Needed Digestive Break Chart I-15Bonds Are Pricey...   Cyclical dynamics also paint a poor outlook for bonds. Globally, the supply of government securities is swelling by approximately $6 trillion, which will slowly lift depressed term premia. Moreover, there has been a sharp incline in excess liquidity as approximated by the gap between our US Financial Liquidity Index and the rate of change of the US LEI. Such a development has led yields higher since the GFC (Chart I-16). Finally, the diffusion index of fifteen Swedish economic variables has started to recover, an indicator that often signals higher yields (Chart I-17). Sweden is an excellent bellwether for the global business cycle because it is a small, open economy where shipments of industrial and intermediate goods account for 55% of exports. Chart I-16...And Vulnerable To Excess Liquidity Chart I-17Sweden's Message   The FX market also offers reasonably priced vehicles to bet on the burgeoning global cyclical upswing. Balance-of-payments dynamics are increasingly bearish for the US dollar. A fall in the household savings rate will widen the current account deficit because the fiscal balance remains deeply negative. Meanwhile, US real interest rate differentials are narrowing, thus the capital account surplus will likely recede. The resulting balance-of-payment deficit will accentuate selling pressures on the USD created by a pick-up in global industrial activity (Chart I-18). AUD/CHF offers another attractive opportunity. The AUD trades near a record low relative to the CHF, yet this cross will benefit from a rebound in global nominal GDP growth (Chart I-19). Moreover, Australia managed the COVID-19 crisis very well and it can proceed quickly with its re-opening. Meanwhile, the expensiveness of the CHF versus the EUR will continue to foster deflationary pressures in Switzerland. This contrast ensures that the Swiss National Bank remains more dovish than the Reserve Bank of Australia. Chart I-18Bearish Dollar Backdrop Chart I-19AUD/CHF As A Bet On The Recovery   Within equities, deep cyclical stocks remain attractive relative to defensive ones. The same acceleration in our excess liquidity proxy that warned of a fall in bond prices indicates that the cyclicals-to-defensives ratio should appreciate. This ratio also benefits meaningfully when the dollar depreciates. A weaker dollar is synonymous with stronger global industrial production. It also eases deflationary pressures and boosts the price of commodities, which increases pricing power for industrial, material and energy stocks. Finally, the cyclical-to-defensives ratio rises when the silver-to-gold ratio turns up. An outperformance of silver has been an important signal that reflation is starting to improve the global economic outlook (Chart I-20).7 Chart I-20Cyclicals Have Not Priced In The Recovery Banks also offer attractive opportunities. Investors have clobbered banks because they expect prodigious non-performing loans (NPL) due to the threats to private-sector balance sheets from the deepest recession in nine decades. However, NPLs are not expanding by as much as anticipated thanks to the ample support by global monetary and fiscal authorities. Moreover, banks were conservative and built loss reserves ahead of the crisis. In this context, the extreme valuation discount embedded in banks relative to the S&P 500 seems exaggerated (Chart I-21). Additionally, the gap between the expected growth rate of banks’ long-term earnings and that of the broad market is wider than at any other point in the past 15 years. Investors have also bid up the price of protection against bank shares (Chart I-22). Therefore, despite near-term risks induced by the Fed’s Stress Test, banks are a cheap contrarian bet on a global recovery. Chart I-21Banks Are Cheap Chart I-22Banks As A Contrarian Bet     Investors should continue to favor foreign versus US equities, which is consistent with our positive outlook on banks and deep cyclical stocks, as well as our negative disposition toward the dollar. Foreign stocks outperform US ones when the dollar depreciates because the former overweight cyclical equities and financials (Chart I-23). Moreover, foreign stocks trade at discounts to US equities and embed significantly lower expected cash flow growth, which suggests that they would offer investors upside from the impending global economic recovery. Chart I-23Favor Foreign Stocks EM stocks fit within this context. Both EM FX and equities trade at a valuation discount consistent with an upcoming rally (Chart I-24). Moreover, cheap valuations increase the likelihood that a depreciating US dollar will boost EM currencies by easing global financial conditions. Moreover, the momentum of EM equities relative to global ones is forming a positive divergence with the price ratio, which is consistent with liquidity making its way into these markets (Chart I-25). Our Emerging Markets Strategy team is more worried about EM stocks than we are because EM bourses would be unlikely to participate as much as US ones in a mania driven by retail investors.8 Chart I-24Attractive EM Valuations Chart I-25EM: A Coiled-Spring Bet On A Weaker Dollar?   Chart I-26Japanese Stocks As A Trade Finally, an opportunity to overweight Japanese equities has emerged. The Nikkei has collapsed in conjunction with a meltdown in Japanese industrial production. However, Japanese earnings should recover faster than in the rest of the world. Japan has efficiently handled its COVID-19 outbreak with fewer lockdowns. Moreover, Japan’s earnings per share (EPS) are highly levered to both the global business cycle and China’s economic fluctuations. Consequently, if we expect global activity to recover and China’s credit and fiscal impulse to continue to improve, then we also anticipate that Japan’s EPS will outperform the MSCI All-Country World Index (Chart I-26). Additionally, on a price-to-cash flow basis, Japanese equities trade at a deep-enough discount to global stocks to foreshadow an upcoming period of outperformance. Bottom Line: Equities will be tossed about for the coming quarter or two, buffeted between five tailwinds and three headwinds. While the S&P is expected to gyrate between 2800 and 3200 this summer, investors can seek alpha by selling bonds, selling the dollar and buying AUD/CHF, and favoring deep cyclical stocks as well as banks at the expense of defensives. As a corollary, foreign equities, especially Japanese ones, have a window to outperform the US. EM stocks could also generate excess returns, but they are a more uncertain bet. Exploring Long-Term Risks We explore some investment implications linked to our theme of structurally rising inflation, which will cause lower real long-term portfolio returns than in the previous four decades. Populism and the ossification of the supply-side of the economy will push inflation up this cycle toward an average of 3% to 5%.9  Chart I-27S&P 500 Long-Term Perspective Adjusted for inflation, the 10-year cumulative average return for stocks stands at 12.4%, which is an elevated reading. The strength of the past performance increases the probability that a period of mean reversion is near (Chart I-27). The end of the debt supercycle raises the likelihood that an era of low real returns will materialize. Non-financial debt accounts for 258.7% of GDP, a level only topped at the depth of the Great Depression when nominal GDP collapsed by 46% from its 1929 peak. Meanwhile, yields are at record lows (Chart I-28). Such a combination suggests that there is little way forward to boost debt by enough to enhance growth, especially when each additional dollar of debt generates a diminishing amount of output. Chart I-28The End Of The Debt Super Cycle Chart I-29Little Room To Cut Taxes Populist governments will remain profligate and play an expanding role in the economy instead of accepting the necessary increase in savings required to reduce debt and create a more robust economy. However, effective personal and corporate tax rates are already very low in the US (Chart I-29). Therefore, the only way to offer fiscal support would be to increase government spending. Growth will become less vigorous as the government’s share of GDP increases (Chart I-30). Moreover, monetary policy will likely remain lax, which boosts the chance of stagflation developing.   Chart I-30The Bigger The Government, The Lower The Growth Elevated stock multiples are a problem for long-term investors. The S&P 500’s Shiller P/E ratio stands at 29.1, and its price-to-sales ratio is at 2.2. If bond yields remain minimal, then low discount rates can rationalize those extreme multiples. However, if inflation moves above 4%, especially when real output is not expanding robustly, then multiples will mean-revert and equities will generate subpar real returns. Chart I-31Profit Margins: From Tailwind To Headwind? Profit margins pose an additional problem for stocks. The decline in unit labor costs relative to selling prices has allowed abnormally wide domestic EBITDA margins to persist (Chart I-31). However, inflation, populism, greater government involvement in the economy and lower efficiency of supply chains will conspire to undo this extraordinary level of profitability. In other words, while the share of national income taken up by wages will expand, profits will account for a progressively smaller slice of output. (Chart I-31, bottom panel). Lower profit margins will push down RoE and accentuate the decline in multiples while also hurting projected long-term cash flows. Chart I-32Elevated Household Exposure To Stocks Finally, from a structural perspective, households are already aggressively overweighting equities. Stocks comprise 54% of US households’ discretionary portfolios. US households held more shares only in 1968 and 2000, two years that marked the beginning of painful drops in real stock prices (Chart I-32). US stocks are most vulnerable to the increase of inflation. Not only are they much more expensive than their global counterparts, but as the Section II special report written by Matt Gertken highlights, the growing nationalism spreading around the world hurts the global order built by and around the US during the past 70 years. With this system of influence diminished, US firms will not be able to command their current valuation premium. Despite low expected real rates of return, equities will still outperform bonds in the coming decade (Table I-2). Even though stocks are more volatile than bonds, stocks have not significantly outperformed bonds during the past 35 years. This was possible because inflation fell from its peak in the early 1980s. However, bonds are unlikely to once again generate higher risk-adjusted returns than equities if inflation bottoms. Moreover, bonds are more expensive than stocks (Chart I-33). A structural bear market in bonds would hurt risk-parity strategies and end the incredible strength in growth stocks. Table I-2Rising Inflation Flatters Stocks Over Bonds The outperformance of stocks over bonds will be of little solace to investors if equities generate poor real returns. Instead, investors should explore commodities, an asset class that benefits from rising inflation, especially given the combination of strong government spending and too-accommodative monetary policy. Moreover, after a decade of weak capex in natural resource extraction, the supply of commodities will expand slowly. Hence, our base case this cycle is for a weakening in the stock-to-gold ratio (Chart I-34). The stock-to-industrial commodities ratio will also fall from its heady levels. As a result, the energy, materials and industrial sectors are attractive on a long-term basis beyond the next six to 12 months. Chart I-33Bonds Look Worse Than Stocks... Chart I-34...But Gold Looks The Best   Mathieu Savary Vice President The Bank Credit Analyst June 25, 2020 Next Report: July 30, 2020   II. Nationalism And Globalization After COVID-19 Economic shocks in recent decades have led to surges in nationalism and the COVID-19 crisis is unlikely to be different. Nationalism adds to the structural challenges facing globalization, which is already in retreat. Investors face at least a 35% chance that President Trump will be reelected and energize a nationalist and protectionist agenda that is globally disruptive. China is also indulging in nationalism as trend growth slows, raising the probability of a clash with the US even if Trump does not win. US-China economic decoupling will present opportunities as well as risks – primarily for India and Southeast Asia. Since the Great Recession, investors have watched the US dollar and US equities outperform their peers in the face of a destabilizing world order (Chart II-1). Chart II-1US Outperformance Amid Global Disorder Global and American economic policy uncertainty has surged to the highest levels on record. Investors face political and geopolitical power struggles, trade wars, a global pandemic and recession, and social unrest.  How will these risks shape up in the wake of COVID-19? First, massive monetary and fiscal stimulus ensure a global recovery but they also remove some of the economic limitations on countries that are witnessing a surge in nationalism.  Second, nationalism creates a precarious environment for globalization – namely the wave of “hyper-globalization” since 2000. Nationalism and de-globalization do not depend on the United States alone but rather have shifted to the East, which means that geopolitical risks will remain elevated even if the US presidential election sees a restoration of the more dovish Democratic Party.  Economic Shocks Fuel Nationalism’s Revival Nationalism is the idea that the political state should be made up of a single ethnic or cultural community. While many disasters have resulted from this idea, it is responsible for the modern nation-state and it has enabled democracies to take shape across Europe, the Americas, and beyond. Industrialization is also more feasible under nationalism because cultural conformity helps labor competitiveness.10  At the end of the Cold War, transnational communist ideology collapsed and democratic liberalism grew complacent. Each successive economic shock or major crisis has led to a surge in nationalism to fill the ideological gaps that were exposed. Chart II-2The Resurgence Of Russian Nationalism Chart II-3USA: From Nationalism To Anti-Nationalism   For instance, various nationalists and populists emerged from the financial crises of the late 1990s. Russian President Vladimir Putin sought to restore Russia to greatness in its own and other peoples’ eyes (Chart II-2). Not every Russian adventure has mattered for investors, but taken together they have undermined the stability of the global system and raised barriers to exchange. The invasion of Crimea in 2014 and the interference in the US election in 2016 helped to fuel the rise in policy uncertainty, risk premiums in Russian assets, and safe havens over the past decade. The September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States created a surge in American nationalism (Chart II-3). This surge has since collapsed, but while it lasted the US destabilized the Middle East and provided Russia and China with the opportunity to pursue a nationalist path of their own. Investors who went long oil and short the US dollar at this time could have done worse. The 2008 crisis spawned new waves of nationalist feeling in countries such as China, Japan, the UK, and India (Chart II-4). Conservatives of the majority cultural group rose to power, including in China, where provincial grassroots members of the elite reasserted the Communist Party’s centrality. Japan and India became excellent equity investment opportunities in their respective spheres, while the UK and China saw their currencies weaken.  The rising number of wars and conflicts across the world since 2008 reflects the shift toward nationalism, whether among minority groups seeking autonomy or nation-states seeking living space (Chart II-5). Chart II-4Nationalist Trends Since The Great Recession Chart II-5World Conflicts Rise After Major Crises   COVID-19 is the latest economic shock that will feed a new round of nationalism. At least 750 million people are extremely vulnerable across the world, mostly concentrated in the shatter belt from Libya to Turkey, Iran, Pakistan, and India.11 Instability will generate emigration and conflict. Once again the global oil supply will be at risk from Middle Eastern instability and the dollar will eventually fall due to gargantuan budget and trade deficits. Today’s shock will differ, however, in the way it knocks against globalization, a process that has already begun to slow. Specifically, this crisis threatens to generate instability in East Asia – the workshop of the world – due to the strategic conflict between the US and China. This conflict will play out in the form of “proxy battles” in Greater China and the East Asian periphery. The dollar’s recent weakness is a telling sign of the future to come. In the short run, however, political and geopolitical risks are acute and will support safe havens. Globalization In Retreat Nationalism is not necessarily at odds with globalization. Historically there are many cases in which nationalism undergirds a foreign policy that favors trade and eschews military intervention. This is the default setting of maritime powers such as the British and Dutch. Prior to WWII it was the American setting, and after WWII it was the Japanese. Over the past thirty years, however, the rise of nationalism has generally worked against global trade, peace, and order. That’s because after WWII most of the world accepted internationalist ideals and institutions promoted by the United States that encouraged free markets and free trade. Serious challenges to that US-led system are necessarily challenges to global trade. This is true even if they originate in the United States. Globalization has occurred in waves continuously since the sixteenth century. It is not a light matter to suggest that it is experiencing a reversal. Yet the best historical evidence suggests that global imports, as a share of global output, have hit a major top (Chart II-6).12 The line in this chart will fall further in 2020. American household deleveraging, China’s secular slowdown, and the 2014 drop in oil and commodities have had a pervasive impact on the export contribution to global growth.   Chart II-6Globalization Hits A Major Top Chart II-7Both Goods And Services Face Headwinds The next upswing of the business cycle will prompt an increase in trade in 2021. Global fiscal stimulus this year amounts to 8% of GDP and counting. But will the import-to-GDP ratio surpass previous highs? Probably not anytime soon. It is impossible to recreate America’s consumption boom and China’s production boom of the 1980s-2000s with public debt alone. Global trend growth is slowing. Isn’t globalization proceeding in services, if not goods? The world is more interconnected than ever, with nearly half of the population using the Internet – almost 30% in Sub-Saharan Africa. One in every two people uses a smartphone. Eventually the pandemic will be mitigated and global travel will resume. Nevertheless, the global services trade is also facing headwinds. And it requires even more political will to break down barriers for services than it does for goods (Chart II-7). The desire of nations to control and patrol cyberspace has resulted in separate Internets for authoritarian states like Russia and China. Even democracies are turning to censorship and content controls to protect their ideologies.  Political demands to protect workers and industries are gaining ground. Policymakers in China and Russia have already shifted back toward import substitution; now the US and EU are joining them, at least when it comes to strategic sectors (health, defense). Nationalists and populists across the emerging world will follow their lead. Regional and wealth inequalities are driving populations to be more skeptical of globalization. GDP per capita has not grown as fast as GDP itself, a simple indication of how globalization does not benefit everyone equally even though it increases growth overall (Chart II-8). Inequality is a factor not only because of relatively well-off workers in the developed world who resent losing their job or earning less than their neighbors. Inequality is also rife in the developing world where opportunities to work, earn higher wages, borrow, enter markets, and innovate are lacking. Over the past decade, emerging countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, and South Africa have seen growing skepticism about whether foreign openness creates jobs or lifts wages.13  Immigration is probably the clearest indication of the break from globalization. The United States and especially the European Union have faced an influx of refugees and immigrants across their southern borders and have resorted to hard-nosed tactics to put a stop to it (Chart II-9). Chart II-8Global Inequality Fuels Protectionism Chart II-9US And EU Crack Down On Immigration   There is zero chance that these tough tactics will come to an end anytime soon in Europe, where the political establishment has discovered a winning combination with voters by promoting European integration yet tightening control of borders. This combination has kept populists at bay in France, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, and Germany. A degree of nationalism has been co-opted by the transnational European project. In the US, extreme polarization could cause a major change in immigration policy, depending on the election later this year. But note that the Obama administration was relatively hawkish on the border and the next president will face sky-high unemployment, which discourages flinging open the gates.  Reduced immigration will weigh on potential GDP growth and drive up the wage bill for domestic corporations. If nationalism continues to rise and to hinder the movement of people, goods, capital, and ideas, then it will reduce the market’s expectations of future earnings. American Nationalism Still A Risk  The United States is experiencing a “Civil War Lite” that may take anywhere from one-to-five years to resolve. The November 3 presidential election will have a major impact on the direction of nationalism and globalization over the coming presidential term. If President Trump is reelected – which we peg at 35% odds – then American nationalism and protectionism will gain a new lease on life. Other nations will follow the US’s lead. If Trump fails, then nationalism will likely be driven by external forces, but protectionism will persist in some form. Chart II-10Trump Is Not Yet Down For The Count Investors should not write Trump off. If the election were held today, Trump would lose, but the election is still four months away. His national approval rating has troughed at a higher level than previous troughs. His disapproval rating has spiked but has not yet cleared its early 2019 peak (Chart II-10).14 This is despite an unprecedented deluge of bad news: universal condemnation from Democrats and the media, high-profile defections from fellow Republicans and cabinet members, stunning defeats at the Supreme Court, and scathing rebukes from top US army officers. If Trump’s odds are 35% then this translates to a 35% chance that the United States will continue pursuing globally disruptive “America First” foreign and trade policies in the 2020-24 period.    First Trump will attempt to pass a Reciprocal Trade Act to equalize tariffs with all trading partners. Assuming Democrats block it in the House of Representatives, he will still have sweeping executive authority to levy tariffs. He will launch the next round in the trade war with China to secure a “Phase Two” trade deal, which will be tougher because it will be focused on structural reforms. He could also open new fronts against the European Union, Mexico, and other trade surplus countries. By contrast, these risks will melt away if Biden is elected. Biden would restore the Obama administration’s approach of trade favoritism toward strategic allies and partners, such as Europe and the members of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, but only occasional use of tariffs. Biden would work with international organizations like the World Trade Organization. His foreign policy would also open up trade with pariah states like Iran, reducing the tail-risk of a war to almost zero.  Biden would be tougher on China than Presidents Obama or Bill Clinton, as the consensus in Washington is now hawkish and Biden would need to keep the blue-collar voters he won back from Trump. He may keep Trump’s tariffs in place as negotiating leverage. But he is less likely to expand these tariffs – and there is zero chance he will use them against Europe. At the same time, it will take a year or more to court the allies and put together a “coalition of the willing” to pressure China on structural reforms and liberalization. China would get a reprieve – and so would financial markets. Thus investors have a roughly 65% chance of seeing US policy “normalize” into an internationalist (not nationalist) approach that reduces the US contribution to trade policy uncertainty and geopolitical risk over the next few years at minimum. But there are still four months to go before the election; these odds can change, and equity market volatility will come first. Moreover a mellower US would still need to react to nationalism in Asia. European Nationalism Not A Risk (Yet) Chart II-11English Versus Scottish Nationalism European nationalism has reemerged in recent years but has greatly disappointed the prophets of doom who expected it to lead to the breakup of the European Union. The southern European states suffered the most from COVID-19 but many of them have made their decision regarding nationalism and the supra-national EU. Greece underwent a depression yet remained in the union. Italians could easily elect the right-wing anti-establishment League to head a government in the not-too-distant future. But there is no appetite for an Italian exit. Brexit is the grand exception. If Trump wins, then the UK and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will be seen as the vanguard of the revival of nationalism in the West. If Trump loses, English nationalism will appear an isolated case that is constrained by its own logic given the response of Scottish nationalism (Chart II-11). The trend in the British Isles would become increasingly remote from the trends in continental Europe and the United States. The majority of Europeans identify both as Europeans and as their home nationality, including majorities in countries like Greece, Italy, France, and Austria where visions of life outside the union are the most robust (Chart II-12). Even the Catalonians are focused on options other than independence, which has fallen to 36% support. Eastern European nationalists play a careful balancing game of posturing against Brussels yet never drifting so far as to let Russia devour them. Chart II-12European Nationalism Is Limited (For Now) Europeans have embraced the EU as a multi-ethnic confederation that requires dual allegiances and prioritizes the European project. COVID-19 has so far reinforced this trend, showing solidarity as the predominant force, and much more promptly than during the 2011 crisis. It will take a different kind of crisis to reverse this trend of deeper integration. European nationalists would benefit from another economic crash, a new refugee wave from the Middle East, or conflict with Turkish nationalism. The latter is already burning brightly and will eventually flame out, but not before causing a regional crisis of some kind. European policymakers are containing nationalism by co-opting some of its demands. The EU is taking steps to guard against globalization, particularly on immigration and Chinese mercantilism. The lack of nationalist uprisings in Europe do not overthrow the contention that globalization is slowing down. Europe can become more integrated at home while maintaining the higher barriers against globalization that it has always maintained relative to the UK and United States. Chinese Nationalism The Biggest Risk The nationalist risk to globalization is most significant in East Asia and the Pacific, where Chinese nationalism continues the ascent that began with the Great Recession. China’s slowdown in growth rates has weakened the Communist Party’s confidence in the long-term viability of single-party rule. The result has been a shift in the party line to promote ideology and quality of life improvements to compensate for slower income gains. Xi Jinping’s governing philosophy consists of nationalist territorial gains, promoting “the China Dream” for the middle class, and projecting ambitious goals of global influence by 2035 and 2049. The result has been a clash between mainland Chinese and peripheral Chinese territories – especially Hong Kong and Taiwan (Chart II-13). The turn away from Chinese identity in these areas runs up against their economic interest. It is largely a reaction to the surge in mainland nationalist sentiment, which cannot be observed directly due to the absence of reliable opinion polling. Chart II-13AChinese Nationalism On The Mainland, Anti-Nationalism In Periphery Chart II-13BChinese Nationalism On The Mainland, Anti-Nationalism In Periphery   The conflict over identity in Greater China is perhaps the world’s greatest geopolitical risk. While Hong Kong has no conceivable alternative to Beijing’s supremacy, Taiwan does. The US is interested in reviving its technological and defense relationship with Taiwan now that it seeks to counterbalance China. Chart II-14Taiwan: Epicenter Of US-China Cold War Beijing may be faced with a technology cordon imposed by the United States, and yet have the option of circumventing this cordon via Taiwan’s advanced semiconductor manufacturing. Taiwan’s “Silicon Shield” used to be its security guarantee. Now that the US is tightening export controls and sanctions on China, Beijing has a greater need to confiscate that shield. This makes Taiwan the epicenter of the US-China struggle, as we have highlighted since 2016. The risk of a fourth Taiwan Strait crisis is as pertinent in the short run as it is over the long run, given that the US and China have already intensified their saber-rattling in the Strait (Chart II-14), including in the wake of COVID-19 specifically. China’s secular slowdown is prompting it to encroach on the borders of all of its neighbors simultaneously, creating a nascent balance-of-power alliance ranging from India to Australia to Japan. If China fails to curb its nationalism, then eventually US political polarization will decline as the country unites in the face of a peer competitor. If American divisions persist, they could drive the US to instigate conflict with China. Thus a failure of either side to restrain itself is a major geopolitical risk. The US and China ultimately face mutually assured destruction in the event of conflict, but they can have a clash in the near term before they learn their limits. The Cold War provides many occasions of such a learning process – from the Berlin airlift to the Cuban missile crisis. Such crises typically present buying opportunities for financial markets, but the consequences could be more far reaching if the Asian manufacturing supply chain is permanently damaged or if the shifting of supply chains out of China is too rapid. Globalization will also suffer as a result of currency wars. The US has not been successful in driving the dollar down, a key demand of the US-China trade war. It is much harder to force China to reform its labor and wage policies than it is to force it to appreciate its currency. But unlike Japan in 1985, China will not commit to unilateral appreciation for fear of American economic sabotage.   Punitive measures will remain an American tool. Contrary to popular belief, the US is not attempting to eliminate its trade deficit. It is attempting to reduce overreliance on China. Status quo globalization is intolerable for US strategy. But autarky is intolerable for US corporations. The compromise is globalization-ex-China, i.e., economic decoupling. Investment Implications Chart II-15Favor International Stocks As Growth Revives US stock market’s capitalization now makes up 58% of global capitalization (Chart II-15), reflecting the strength and innovation of American companies as well as a worldwide flight to safety during a decade of rising policy uncertainty and geopolitical risk. The revival of global growth amid this year’s gargantuan stimulus will prompt a major rotation out of US equities and into international and emerging market equities over the long run. As mentioned, the US greenback would also trend downward. However, there will be little clarity on the pace of nationalism and the fate of globalization until the US election is decided. Moreover the fate of globalization does not depend entirely on the United States. It mostly depends on countries in the east – Russia, China, and India, all of which are increasingly nationalistic.  A miscalculation over Taiwan, North Korea, the East China Sea, the South China Sea, trade, or technology could ignite into tariffs, sanctions, boycotts, embargoes, saber-rattling, proxy battles, and potentially even direct conflict. These risks are elevated in the short run but will persist in the long run. As the US decouples from China it will have to deepen relations with other trading partners. The trade deficit will not go away but will be redistributed to Asian allies. Southeast Asian nations and India – whose own nationalism has created a shift in favor of economic development – will be the long-run beneficiaries. Matt Gertken  Vice President Geopolitical Strategist   III. Indicators And Reference Charts We continue to favor stocks at the expense of bonds, a view held since our April issue. Global fiscal and monetary conditions remain highly accommodative. Now that the global economy is starting to recover as lockdowns ease, another tailwind for stocks has emerged. Nonetheless, last month we warned that the S&P 500 was entering a consolidation phase and that a pattern of volatile ups and downs would ensue. The combination of tactically overbought markets, elevated geopolitical risk, and a looming second wave of infections continues to sustain this short-term view. Hence, the S&P 500 is likely to churn between 2088 and 3200 over the coming months. On a cyclical basis, the same factors that made us willing buyers of stocks since late March remain broadly in place. Stocks are becoming increasingly expensive, but monetary conditions are extremely accommodative. Our Speculation Indicator continues to send a benign signal, which indicates that from a cyclical perspective, the market is not especially vulnerable. Finally, our Revealed Preference Indicator is flashing a strong buy signal. Tactically, equities must still digest the heady gains made since March 23. We have had five 5% or more corrections since March 23. More of them are in the cards. Both our Tactical Strength Indicator and the share of NYSE stocks trading above their 10-week moving averages point to a pullback of 5% to 10%. Moreover, while it remains extremely stimulative, our Monetary Indicator is not rising anymore, which increases the probability that traders start to pay more attention to geopolitical risks. According to our Bond Valuation Index, Treasurys are significantly more overvalued than equities. Additionally, our Composite Technical Indicator is losing momentum. This backdrop is dangerous for bonds, especially when sentiment towards this asset class is as high as it is today and economic growth is turning the corner. Finally, we expect the yield curve to steepen, especially for very long maturities where the Fed is less active. In a similar vein, inflation breakeven rates are a clean vehicle to bet on higher yields. Since we last published, the dollar has broken down. The greenback is expensive and its counter-cyclicality is a major handicap during a global economic recovery. Additionally, the US twin deficits are increasingly problematic. The fiscal deficit remains exceptionally wide and the re-opening of the US economy will pull down the household savings rate. The current account deficit is therefore bound to widen. The continued low level of real interest rates will complicate financing this deficit and to equilibrate the funding of US liabilities, the dollar will depreciate. The widening in the current account deficit also means that the large increase in money supply by the Fed will leak out of the US economy. This process will accentuate the dollar’s negative impulse. Technically, the accelerating downward momentum in our Dollar Composite Technical Indicator also warns of additional downside for the USD. Commodities continue to gain traction. The rapid move up in the Baltic Dry index suggests that more gains are in store for natural resource prices, especially as our momentum indicator is gaining strength. Moreover, the commodity advance/decline line remains in an uptrend. A global economic recovery, a weakening dollar, and falling real interest rates (driven by easy policy) indicate that fundamental factors – not just technical ones – are also increasingly commodity bullish. Tactically, if stocks churn, as we expect, commodities will likely do so as well. However, this move should also be seen as a consolidation of previous gains. Finally, gold remains strong, lifted by accommodative monetary conditions and a weak dollar. However, the yellow metal is now trading at a significant premium to its short-term fundamentals. Gold too is likely to trade in a volatile sideways pattern, especially if bond yields rise. EQUITIES: Chart III-1US Equity Indicators Chart III-2Willingness To Pay For Risk Chart III-3US Equity Sentiment Indicators   Chart III-4Revealed Preference Indicator Chart III-5US Stock Market Valuation Chart III-6US Earnings Chart III-7Global Stock Market And Earnings: Relative Performance Chart III-8Global Stock Market And Earnings: Relative Performance   FIXED INCOME:   Chart III-9US Treasurys And Valuations Chart III-10Yield Curve Slopes Chart III-11Selected US Bond Yields Chart III-1210-Year Treasury Yield ComponentsChart III-13US Corporate Bonds And Health Monitor Chart III-14Global Bonds: Developed Markets Chart III-15Global Bonds: Emerging Markets   CURRENCIES: Chart III-16US Dollar And PPP Chart III-17US Dollar And Indicator Chart III-18US Dollar Fundamentals Chart III-19Japanese Yen Technicals Chart III-20Euro Technicals Chart III-21Euro/Yen Technicals Chart III-22Euro/Pound Technicals   COMMODITIES: Chart III-23Broad Commodity Indicators Chart III-24Commodity Prices Chart III-25Commodity Prices Chart III-26Commodity Sentiment Chart III-27Speculative Positioning   ECONOMY: Chart III-28US And Global Macro Backdrop Chart III-29US Macro Snapshot Chart III-30US Growth Outlook Chart III-31US Cyclical Spending Chart III-32US Labor Market Chart III-33US Consumption Chart III-34US Housing Chart III-35US Debt And Deleveraging   Chart III-36US Financial Conditions Chart III-37Global Economic Snapshot: Europe Chart III-38Global Economic Snapshot: China   Mathieu Savary Vice President The Bank Credit Analyst Footnotes 1  Please see Geopolitical Strategy "Social Unrest Can Still Cause Volatility," dated June 5, 2020, available at gps.bcaresearch.com 2  Please see The Bank Credit Analyst "June 2020," dated May 28, 2020, available at bca.bcaresearch.com 3  Please see Geopolitical Strategy "Introducing: The Median Voter Theory," dated June 8, 2016, available at gps.bcaresearch.com 4  Please see US Investment Strategy "So Far, So Good (How Markets Learned To Stop Worrying And Love Washington, DC)," dated June 8, 2020, available at usis.bcaresearch.com 5  The control group excludes auto and gas stations, and building materials. 6  Please see Geopolitical Strategy "Geopolitics Is The Next Shoe To Drop," dated April 10, 2020, available at gps.bcaresearch.com 7  Gold and silver are precious metals that benefit from lower interest rates and a weak dollar. However, a much larger proportion of the demand for silver comes from industrial processes. Thus, silver outperforms gold when an economic recovery is imminent. 8  Please see Emerging Markets Strategy "A FOMO-Driven Mania?," dated June 4, 2020, and Emerging Markets Strategy "EM: Follow The Momentum," dated June 18, 2020, available at ems.bcaresearch.com 9  Please see The Bank Credit Analyst "June 2020," dated May 28, 2020, available at bca.bcaresearch.com 10  Ernest Gellner, Nations and Nationalism (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1983). 11  Neli Esipova, Julie Ray, and Ying Han, “750 Million Struggling To Meet Basic Needs With No Safety Net,” Gallup News, June 16, 2020.  12  Christopher Chase-Dunn et al, “The Development of World-Systems,” Sociology of Development 1 (2015), pp. 149-172; and Chase-Dunn, Yukio Kawano, Benjamin Brewer, “Trade globalization since 1795: waves of integration in the world-system,” American Sociological Review 65 (2000), pp. 77-95.  13  Bruce Stokes, “Americans, Like Many In Other Advanced Economies, Not Convinced Of Trade’s Benefits,” September 26, 2018. 14  In other words, the mishandling of COVID-19 and the historic George Floyd protests of June 2020 have not taken as great of a toll on Trump’s national approval, thus far, as the Ukraine scandal last October, the government shutdown in January-February 2019, the near-failure to pass tax cuts in December 2017, or the Charlottesville incident in August 2017. This is surprising and points once more to Trump’s very solid political base, which could serve as a springboard for a comeback over the next four months.

Despite the strong rally in stocks since mid-March and a looming second wave of the pandemic, we continue to recommend that investors overweight equities on a 12-month horizon. Needless to say, this view has raised some eyebrows. With that in mind, this week we present a Q&A from the perspective of a skeptical reader who does not fully share our enthusiasm. Q: You said last week that a second wave of the pandemic is now your base case, yet you’re still sticking with your positive 12-month equity view. Why? A: A second wave of the pandemic, along with uncertainty about how the coming fiscal cliff in the US will be resolved, could unnerve investors temporarily. Nevertheless, we expect global equities to rise by about 10% from current levels over the next 12 months, handily outperforming bonds. While low interest rates and copious amounts of cash on the sidelines will provide a supportive backdrop for stocks, the main impetus for higher equity prices will be a recovery in economic activity and corporate profits. Q: It is hard to see the economy recovering very much if there is a second wave. A: It is important to get the arrow of causation right. Part of the reason we expect a second wave is because we think policymakers will continue to relax lockdown measures even if, as has already occurred in a number of US states, the infection rate rises. Granted, a second wave will moderate the pace at which containment measures can be dismantled. It will also prompt people to engage in more social distancing. Thus, a second wave would make the economic recovery slower than it otherwise would have been. However, it is doubtful that growth will grind to a halt. The appetite for continued lockdowns has clearly waned. For better or for worse, most western nations will follow the “Swedish model” of trying to limit the spread of the virus without imposing draconian restrictions on society. Chart 1CBO Projects The Unemployment Rate Will Fall Very Slowly Q: Even if the Swedish model works, and I doubt it will, we are still in a very deep economic hole. The unemployment rate in many countries is the highest since the Great Depression. The Congressional Budget Office does not foresee the US unemployment rate falling below 5% until 2028. A return to positive growth seems like a very low bar for success. We may need many years of above-trend growth just to get back to the pre-pandemic level of GDP! A: The Congressional Budget Office is too pessimistic in assuming that the recovery will be as sluggish as the one following the Great Recession (Chart 1). That recovery was weighed down by the need to repair household balance sheets after the bursting of a debt-fueled housing bubble. The current downturn was caused by external forces – an exogenous shock in econospeak. Historically, recoveries following exogenous shocks have tended to be more rapid than recoveries following recessions that were instigated by endogenous problems. Q: That may be so, but Wall Street is already penciling in a very rapid recovery. Last I checked, analysts expect S&P 500 earnings next year to be close to where they were last year. A: One has to be careful when comparing earnings estimates with economic growth projections. Chart 2 shows a breakdown of S&P 500 EPS estimates by sector. Appendix A also shows the evolution of these estimates over time. While analysts expect overall earnings per share (EPS) to return to last year’s levels in 2021, this is mainly because of the resilient profit outlook in the technology and health care sectors (the two biggest sectors in the S&P 500 by market cap). Outside those two sectors, EPS in 2021 is expected to be down 8.6% from 2019 levels, or 11.2% in real terms. Chart 2Breakdown Of S&P 500 EPS Estimates By Sector If one looks at the cyclically-sensitive industrials sector, earnings are projected to fall by 16% between 2019 and 2021. Energy sector earnings are projected to decline by 65%. Earnings in the consumer discretionary sector are expected to decline by 8%, despite the fact that Amazon accounts for nearly half of the sector by market cap.1 This suggests that analysts are expecting more of a U-shaped economic recovery than a V-shaped one. Chart 3The Present Value Of Earnings: A Scenario Analysis Q: Fair enough, but I am ultimately more interested in what the market is pricing in than what analysts are expecting. It seems to me that stock prices have rebounded much more rapidly than one would have anticipated based on the evolution in earnings estimates. A: That is true, but it is important to keep in mind that the fair value of the stock market does not solely depend on the expected path of earnings. It also depends on the discount rate we use to deflate those earnings. For the sake of argument, let us suppose that S&P 500 earnings only manage to reach $144 per share next year (10% below current consensus) and take five years to return to their pre-pandemic trend. All things equal, such a decline in earnings would reduce the present value of stocks by 4.2% relative to what it was at the start of the year (Chart 3). However, all things are not equal. The US 30-year Treasury yield, adjusted for inflation, has declined by 59 basis points this year. If we use this real yield as a proxy for the discount rate, the fair value of the S&P has actually increased by 8.7% since January 1st, despite the decline in earnings. Q: I think you’re doing a bit of a bait and switch here. You’re assuming that earnings estimates return to trend by the middle of the decade, but that long-term bond yields remain broadly unchanged over this period. If the economy and corporate earnings recover, won’t bond yields just go back to where they were last year, if not higher? A: Not necessarily. Conceptually, there is not a one-to-one mapping between interest rates and the full-employment level of aggregate demand.2 For example, consider a case where an adverse economic shock hits the economy, making households and businesses more reluctant to spend. If that were all there was to the story, the stock market would go down. But there is more to the story than that. Suppose the central bank cuts interest rates in response to this shock, which boosts demand by enough to return the economy to full employment. Now we have a new equilibrium where the level of demand – and by extension, the level of corporate profits – is the same as before but interest rates are lower. The fair value of the stock market has gone up! Q: Hold on. Central banks came into this recession with little fire power left. I agree that their actions have helped the stock market, but they have not been enough to rehabilitate the economy. A: Good point. That is where the role of fiscal policy comes in. One of the unsung benefits of lower interest rates is that they have incentivised governments to borrow more at a time when the economy needs all the fiscal support it can get. As Chart 4 shows, the fiscal response during this year’s downturn has been significantly larger than during the Great Recession. Thus, it is more correct to say that the combination of lower interest rates and fiscal easing have conceivably increased the fair value of the stock market. Chart 4Fiscal Stimulus Is Greater Today Than It Was During The Great Recession Q:  And yet despite all this fiscal and monetary support, GDP remains depressed. A: The point of the stimulus was not to raise output or employment. It was to keep households and businesses solvent during a time when their regular flow of income had dried up. Q: If households and businesses did not spend much of that money, where did it go? A: Much of it remains in the banking system. The US savings rate shot up to 33% in April. As Chart 5 illustrates, this was almost perfectly mirrored by the increase in bank deposits. Anyone who claims that savings have nothing to do with deposits should study this chart. Chart 5Lots Of Savings Slushing Around   Chart 6Stocks That Are Popular With Retail Investors Are Outperforming Q: And now, I suppose, these deposits are flowing into the stock market? A: Correct. That is one reason why stocks popular with retail investors have outperformed the S&P 500 by 30% since mid-March (Chart 6). Q: Have these retail flows really been important enough to matter? A: They have probably been more important than widely portrayed. Many of the online brokerages touting zero-commission trades make their money by selling order flow to hedge funds. Thus, the trading of individuals is magnified by the trading of institutional investors. More liquid markets tend to generate higher prices. There is also another subtle multiplier effect worth considering. You mentioned that money was “flowing into the stock market.” Technically speaking, “flow” is not the best word to use. For the most part, if I decide to buy some shares, someone else has to sell me their shares. On a net basis, there is no inflow of cash into the stock market. Rather, what happens is that my buy order lifts the price of the shares by enough to entice someone to sell their shares. Thus, if retail investors bid up the price of stocks to the point that institutions are forced to sell, those institutions are now left with excess cash that they have to deploy elsewhere in the stock market. As the value of investors’ stock portfolios rises, the percentage of their net worth held in cash falls. This game of hot potato only ends when the percentage of cash held by investors shrinks to a level that is consistent with their preferences. Importantly, this means that changes in the amount of cash on the sidelines can have a “multiplier” effect on stock prices. For example, if cash holdings go up by a dollar, and people want to hold ten times as much stock as cash, then stock market capitalization has to go up by ten dollars. Q: How far along are we in this game of hot potato? A: Despite the rally in stocks since mid-March, cash held in money market funds and savings deposits is still 10% higher as a share of market capitalization than at the start of the year. This suggests that the firepower to fuel further increases in the stock market has not been fully spent. Chart 7Equity Risk Premium Is Still Quite High Q: Wouldn’t you think that after a pandemic people would be more risk-averse and hence inclined to hold more cash? A: That would be a logical assumption, but it is not clear whether it is empirically true. There is some evidence from the psychological literature that people who survive life-threatening events tend to become less risk averse rather than more risk averse after the event has passed.3 A pandemic seems to qualify as a life-threatening event. In any case, when considering the equity risk premium, we should not only think about the riskiness of stocks; we should also think about the riskiness of bonds. Bond yields are near record lows. To the extent that yields cannot fall much from current levels, this makes bonds a less attractive hedge against downside economic news than they once were. So perhaps the equity risk premium, which is still quite high, should actually be lower than it currently is (Chart 7). Q: It seems that much of your optimism is based on the assumption that policy will stay stimulative. On the monetary side, that seems like a safe assumption. However, as you yourself mentioned at the outset, there is a risk that stocks will be upended by a premature tightening in fiscal policy. A: This is indeed a risk. In the US, the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP) will run out of funds over the coming month. The additional $600 per week in benefits that jobless workers are receiving will expire on July 31st, causing average unemployment payments to fall by about 60%. Direct payments to households have also ceased. Together, these three fiscal measures amount to about 5.5% of GDP. Furthermore, most states begin their fiscal year on July 1st. Despite receiving $275 billion in federal aid, they are still facing a roughly $250 billion (1.2% of GDP) financing shortfall in the coming fiscal year, which could force widespread layoffs. The good news is that both Republicans and Democrats want to avert this fiscal cliff. While negotiations over the next stimulus package could unnerve investors for a while, they will ultimately culminate in a deal. The Democrats want more spending, as does the White House. And if public opinion polls are to be believed, congressional Republicans will also cave in to voter demands for continued fiscal largess (Table 1). Table 1There Is Much Public Support For Fiscal Stimulus Q: It seems to me that the fiscal cliff is not the only political risk to worry about. Tensions with China are running high and there is domestic unrest in many cities around the world. Even if fiscal policy remains accommodative, President Trump will probably lose in November. This makes a repeal of his tax cuts more likely than not. A: It is true that betting markets now expect Joe Biden to become president (Chart 8). They also expect Democrats to regain control of the Senate. My personal view is that Trump has a better chance of being reelected than implied by betting markets. While the protests have hurt Trump’s favorability ratings in recent weeks, ongoing unrest could help him, given his claim of being the “law and order” president. It is worth recalling that after falling for more than 20 years, the nationwide homicide rate spiked by 23% between 2014 and 2016 following protests in cities such as St. Louis and Baltimore (Chart 9). This arguably helped Trump get elected, just like the Watts Riot in Los Angeles helped Ronald Reagan get elected as Governor of California in 1966. Chart 8Betting Markets Now Expect Joe Biden To Become President If Senator Biden were to prevail, then yes, Trump’s corporate tax cuts would be in jeopardy. A full repeal of the Trump tax cuts would reduce EPS of S&P 500 companies by about 12%. Chart 9Continued Unrest May Help Trump, As It Has In The Past However, it is possible that Democrats would choose to only partially reverse the corporate tax cuts, while also lifting taxes on higher-income households. One should also note that trade tensions with China would probably diminish under a Biden presidency, which would be a mitigating factor for equity investors. Chart 10Cyclical Sectors Should Outperform Defensives As Global Growth Recovers... And A Weaker Dollar Should Also Help Non-US Stocks Q: So to sum up, you are still bullish on stocks over a 12-month horizon, although you see some near-term risks stemming from the likelihood of a second wave of the pandemic and uncertainty about how and when the fiscal cliff problem in the US will be resolved. What are your favorite sectors, regions, and styles? A: Cyclical sectors should outperform defensives over the next 12 months as global growth recovers. Cyclicals are overrepresented outside the US, which should favor overseas markets. A weaker dollar should also help non-US stocks (Chart 10). The dollar generally trades as a countercyclical currency, implying that it will sell off as global growth recovers. Moreover, unlike last year, the greenback no longer enjoys the benefit of higher interest rates than those abroad. In terms of style, value should outperform growth. Growth stocks have done very well in a falling interest rate environment (Chart 11). However, interest rates cannot fall much further from current levels. Small caps should outperform large caps, both because small caps are more growth-sensitive and because they tend to be more popular among day traders. Google searches for “day trading” have spiked in the past few months (Chart 12). Chart 11Interest Rates Cannot Fall Much Lower From Current Levels, Which Will Allow Value To Outperform Growth Chart 12Day Trading Is Back In Vogue These Days Beyond the pure macro plays, the pandemic could lead to a number of unexpected changes that have yet to be fully discounted by markets. For example, we will likely see a surge in the demand for automobiles as people shun public transit. The pandemic could also accelerate the reshoring of manufacturing activity, particularly in the health care sector. Contract manufacturing companies with significant domestic operations will benefit. Additionally, more people will move to the suburbs to work from home and escape the virus and rising crime. This could boost the demand for new houses and lift suburban real estate prices. Since most suburbs are built on top of land previously zoned for agriculture, farmland prices could also rise. Appendix A Evolution Of S&P 500 EPS Estimates By Sector Peter Berezin Chief Global Strategist peterb@bcaresearch.com Footnotes 1  Amazon EPS is projected to rise by 54% between 2019 and 2021, from 11% of overall consumer discretionary earnings to 19%. 2 One can see this within the context of the IS-LM model that is taught to economics undergraduates. If the LM curve shifts outward while the IS curve shifts inward, one could end up with the situation where aggregate demand is the same as before, but the equilibrium interest rate is lower. 3  For example, Gennaro Bernile, Vineet Bhagwat, and P. Raghavendra Rau investigated the link between the intensity of early-life experiences on CEO’s attitudes towards risk. Their results suggest that CEOs who witnessed extreme levels of fatal natural disasters appear more cautious in approaching risk. In contrast, those that experience disasters without very negative consequences become desensitized to risk. For details, please see Gennaro Bernile, Vineet Bhagwat, and P. Raghavendra Rau, “What Doesn't Kill You Will Only Make You More Risk-Loving: Early-Life Disasters and CEO Behavior,“ The Journal of Finance, (72:1) February 2017.   Global Investment Strategy View Matrix Current MacroQuant Model Scores

Special Report

Highlights Our net assessment of India is bullish over the long run, but this year is full of risks. Prime Minister Modi will struggle to reboot the economy and maintain social stability in his second term. If unemployment, social unrest, and communal tensions spiral out of control, Modi could lose political capital. A foreign policy blunder with China and Pakistan would also weaken Modi’s strongman image. Losses for Modi and the BJP would weigh on India’s potential growth and earnings outlook. Buy Indian stocks on dips, but monitor risks. Go long Indian pharma and local currency government bonds. Feature The Indo-Chinese conflict on the Himalayan border is unlikely to have a significant impact on global financial markets. A major escalation could cause short-term volatility. But most likely an escalation will have a regional impact and present a buying opportunity for Indian, Chinese, or Pakistani equities. There is a potential problem for India, however, in the combination of internal and external political risks. Prime Minister Narendra Modi faces a threat to his popular support because of the economic shock of the COVID-19 pandemic. Insufficient fiscal stimulus will lead to a faltering recovery. Lingering large-scale unemployment will motivate social unrest. Thus Modi will struggle to ensure economic recovery and law and order in his second term. Our base case is that he has the political capital and enough time on the political clock to stabilize the country and his rule. However, a failure to handle domestic challenges poses a risk to our view. And a foreign policy defeat at the hands of the Chinese would further undermine our view. Over the past two months we have written about the risk of social unrest and political instability in emerging markets due to the global pandemic. In this report we extend that analysis to India. We are strategically bullish on India. But a fundamental loss of control by Modi’s administration would skew the risk to the downside over the near and medium term. India’s Domestic Risks India is neither the worst nor the best off among emerging markets. It ranks right in the middle of our COVID-19 Social Unrest Index, mostly because of the status of the economy (Table 1). Table 1Our COVID-19 Social Unrest Index For Emerging Markets Chart 1India's Economic Pain A Challenge For Modi Given that Chile, Russia, and China rank at the top our list, and yet face challenges to their stability, India’s middling position should not be interpreted optimistically. The economic hit has been massive. Manufacturing and especially services PMIs collapsed in April and May, pulling down the composite index to 7.2 and 14.8 respectively, from 50.6 in March – just a hair above the 50 boom-bust line (Chart 1). The breakdown in manufacturing is one of the worst among India’s emerging market peers (Chart 2). This is a problem for a country that is trying to upgrade its manufacturing sector. The domestic economy was frail even prior to COVID. Growth slowed to 4.2% in 2019 from 6.1% in 2018. Discretionary spending by households, reflected in passenger car sales, and capital expenditure by companies were already extremely weak (Chart 3). Chart 2India's Manufacturing Hit Harder Than Other EMs Chart 3India's Consumers And Businesses In Freefall Exports have slowed since 2018 due to the Chinese slowdown and trade war (Chart 4). COVID-19 dashed the small signs of a rebound in early 2020. India runs a twin deficit and its fiscal position is especially precarious. At 7.4% of GDP in 2019, the general government deficit was among the largest going into the pandemic. Coupled with a high debt-to-GDP ratio, fiscal policy is a risk to India’s long run sustainability and foreign investors’ returns (Chart 5). This marks a major limitation on India’s ability to stimulate aggregate demand. Chart 4Consumer-Led, But Not Immune To Global Shock Chart 5Debt Constraint On Stimulus On the positive side, India’s foreign currency reserves are sufficient, and it is capable of repaying the foreign debt obligations coming due in the near term, according to our Emerging Markets Strategy (Chart 6). Thus while it has less fiscal space than some other emerging markets, it is not as exposed to a foreign funding squeeze. Chart 6AIndia Can Cover Foreign Debt Payments Chart 6BIndia Not Over-Reliant On Foreign Capital How large is India’s stimulus package? The headline-grabbing INR 20 trillion stimulus package – equivalent to 10% of GDP – overstates the direct stimulus to the economy (Table 2). Only about 1.3% of GDP consists of genuinely new on-budget spending. This is much bigger than the 0.5% of GDP fiscal stimulus in 2008-10 but smaller than what other major countries have done in the pandemic thus far (Chart 7). Table 2India’s Fiscal And Monetary Stimulus Amid Coronavirus Crisis Chart 7India’s Stimulus: Larger Than GFC, But Smaller Than Many Peers Modi will likely need to unleash more stimulus, but his response thus far indicates that he recognizes the country’s fiscal constraints and is not throwing everything at the economy all at once. The COVID-19 crisis hit not long after Modi reconsolidated power in parliament. He has the political capital to make tough decisions – he is not forced to stimulate the economy frantically for the sake of general elections.1 Thus the administration is unlikely to take the path of fiscal profligacy. This is positive for the debt outlook, although it is negative for the demand outlook and recovery. Structural reform is a cornerstone of Modi’s stimulus package. Finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman has highlighted changes to land, labor, and law as parts of the stimulus package, as well as more typical measures to stimulate demand. For Modi the COVID-19 crisis and stimulus measures provide an opportunity to get reforms back on track after several initiatives, such as land reform, were put on hold in order to concentrate on the single biggest reform initiative of his first term (the goods and services tax). This reform agenda cannot go too far as Modi will be forced to sacrifice painful reforms for the sake of maintaining stability. But as long as India snaps back from its lockdown period like other economies, its decision to keep a lid on spending will enable it to manage inflation and generate savings and capital investment over the long run. This is what India needs to reform its moribund economy. Modi can also cut red tape and bureaucracy to speed the recovery. Bottom Line: Indian policymakers recognize the constraints of large deficits and debt and have thus far shown a reluctance to deploy massive fiscal stimulus. The upside is that India will avoid crowding out private investment that is essential to maintain its economic rise. The downside is a slower recovery. India Re-Opening, But Pandemic Yet To Peak On the pandemic, the good news is that India is experiencing a relatively low number of COVID-19 cases and deaths compared to Brazil and South Africa (Chart 8). This may be due to the early and stringent lockdown, the relatively small elderly share of the population, or other epidemiological factors. India also lags in terms of testing (Chart 9). Chart 8COVID-19 Still Poses A Risk Chart 9India’s COVID Testing Has Lagged However, any surge would devastate India’s weak health care system. The fact that the economy is reopening without having already experienced a peak in new cases bodes ill. What’s more, India does not appear to be in control of the virus’s spread. By contrast, the number of new cases is still rising in India three months after the nationwide lockdown was first imposed. Indians are vulnerable to the virus as they are more susceptible to die from major diseases than many other countries. India spends notoriously little on health. The health care infrastructure is in no shape to withstand a surge in infections. Reports indicate that even at current low COVID-19 infection rates, hospitals are already turning down patients due to a shortage of beds and ventilators. The implication is that India is not prepared to handle an outbreak that reaches levels seen in say Brazil, South Africa, or Turkey. Given that it is already loosening the lockdown without having witnessed a peak in cases, there is a risk that India has yet to experience the worst of the pandemic. Bottom Line: The pandemic has so far been relatively manageable in India. However, cases are still on the rise and are at risk of surging as the nationwide lockdown is eased. India’s poor health infrastructure puts the nation in a weak situation in handling the virus. Even if the virus itself proves overblown, Prime Minister Modi’s political capital could suffer from the health care crisis. The Risk Of Social Unrest Assuming that India muddles through the pandemic, Modi’s next big challenge is large-scale unemployment. Official unemployment figures – which are not published regularly – understate the impact of the deteriorating economic situation on households, as does our COVID-19 Unrest Index. Our index shows that Indian households, relative to EM peers, are not particularly distressed as measured by a combination of the Gini index of inequality and the “misery index” of unemployment and inflation (see Table 1). However, these are real problems for Indians themselves. Especially unemployment. The massive informal sector makes it hard to measure the real employment situation (Chart 10). Informal workers are the most vulnerable and face the greatest uncertainty. Chart 10India’s Informal Sector Masks Real Unemployment Chart 11Household Income Shock Chart 12Job Rolls Shrink For Traders And Workers Data from April, before reopening, show that nearly half of households saw a drop in income, according to the Centre for Monitoring Indian Economy (CMIE) (Chart 11). But the lifting of lockdowns is starting to bring down unemployment which peaked in May at nearly 25%, with small traders and laborers suffering the brunt of the layoffs (Chart 12). Individuals working in this category, along with farmers, are the most likely to be considered part of the informal sector. The improvement in unemployment also overlooks the decline in labor force participation, which fell to 38.7% in May from 43.2% before the pandemic. Therefore while economic reopening is undoubtedly positive for the labor market, the data do not capture the full extent of the impact of the pandemic and recession on household incomes. Moreover, the labor market may not revert to its pre-pandemic status quickly. Despite record unemployment, construction companies – a cornerstone of the Indian economy – were reporting difficulty in accessing labor in late-April when unemployment was at its peak, weighing on their ability to resume work.2 This is because migrants – which account for 20% of the labor force – are reluctant to return to work as they have been traumatized by the lockdown experience during which restrictions on travel left them stranded far away from their families and hometowns. Even though the restrictions have since been eased, many of the migrant workers are choosing to return home rather than take up work in the construction sector. Moreover, on June 9 the Supreme Court ordered states to transport all stranded migrant workers home within 15 days. The court’s request that federal and state governments ensure they are providing employment to migrants will help reduce unemployment among migrants. However, the unemployment rate is likely to stay high due to transitional unemployment. A lesser challenge comes from the collapse of oil-dependent Persian Gulf economies. Overall, remittances account for 3% of India’s GDP, which is substantial. Many of these workers are now jobless and India is repatriating its citizens that are stranded in the Gulf. An estimated 8.5 million Indians work there, which is small relative to the ~519 million strong domestic labor force. But the return of laborers may have an impact in certain regions. For example, the finance minister of Kerala noted they expect 500,000 Indians to return to his state, which could prove destabilizing. Modi’s biggest challenge is unemployment. Bottom Line: The easing of lockdowns has been positive for the jobs market. However, unemployment will be slow to recover to pre-COVID levels. India will face greater household grievances, threatening social unrest. This is a risk to Modi’s political capital over his second term. Communal Tensions Will Worsen Another risk to Modi’s political capital is the rise of communal tensions. These could potentially mobilize the political opposition against Modi, beginning at the state level. They could also lead to a secular rise in domestic insecurity, which would deter foreign investment. Religious polarization is picking up. India’s COVID lockdown brought a halt to anti-government demonstrations which started in December 2019 in protest of the Citizenship Amendment Act. Prior to the lockdown, many Indians had taken to the streets arguing that this act discriminated against the Muslim minority, violated the country’s foundational secular values, and was unconstitutional. Indian views on the law differ according to religion, with 63.5% of Muslims opposing the Act vs. 32.3% of non-Muslims (Chart 13). Chart 13Muslim Minority Opposes Citizenship Law By granting citizenship to illegal migrants who entered India prior to 2014 from Afghanistan, Bangladesh and Pakistan, and who are Hindu, Sikh, Jain, Parsi, Buddhist, or Christian, Modi’s act used religion as a basis for citizenship, discriminating against the Muslim minority – which makes up almost 15% of India’s population. Although the demonstrations have paused, protesters’ grievances and the Citizenship Law itself remain unresolved. If anything, religious tensions intensified during the lockdown period, as police have been arresting high-profile activists. Right-wing groups have accused the Muslim community of being “super spreaders,” and pro-government media highlighted that regions with large populations of Muslims following the Tablighi Jamaat group have more COVID-19 cases.3 For example, these groups spread rumors that Muslim food vendors were intentionally spitting on fruits to spread the virus. They distributed flags to Hindu food vendors to make them more identifiable. Religious polarization and Modi’s suppression of the Muslim community will continue to be a source of instability throughout Modi’s second term. The prime minister’s stance regarding the minority group will not change. Rather, the weak economy will force Modi to seek success elsewhere, including through sectarian rhetoric to fire up his Hindu nationalist political base. Widespread unemployment will stoke these animosities. Thus religious and ideological tensions are likely to pick up rather than die down, resulting in communal violence and even radicalization and terrorism. This point is especially relevant in Muslim-majority Jammu and Kashmir, which is seeing a spike in communal tensions as well as an escalating struggle over the central government’s authority. Modi’s August 2019 decision to revoke the constitutional autonomy of Jammu and Kashmir also increases security risks. While the Indian government justified the move by the need to stop militancy in Kashmir, it is perceived by many Kashmiri Muslims as an attempt to tighten the government’s grip on the region and suppress their interests. The government’s moves in late 2019, which included a lockdown on the citizens of Kashmir, an internet blackout, and the arrest of local politicians and public figures, will provoke dissent, resistance, separatism, and radicalization. Fresh anti-India protests have already arisen in Indian Kashmir after the killing of nine rebels at the hands of Indian forces. The killings followed intelligence received by the Indian government that some of the rebels either wanted Kashmir to be independent or to merge with Muslim-majority Pakistan. According to a tally by the police, 73 rebels have been killed in Indian-administered Kashmir so far this year. New tensions could arise if India encroaches on Pakistan-administered Kashmir or if Pakistan-backed proxy groups strike out against India’s change of Kashmir’s status. This could lead to a more open-ended military confrontation between India and Pakistan than the tit-for-tat attacks in early 2019. The latter incident could be contained due to a novice government in Pakistan and the approaching general election in India, whereas a new round of hostilities might not so easily be dampened. Tensions with Pakistan are already high – two Pakistani embassy officials were expelled by New Delhi on May 31 due to allegations of spying. An India-Pakistan standoff could easily mingle with Sino-Indian tensions given China’s strengthening alliance with Pakistan. India accuses the People’s Liberation Army of assisting Pakistan on its side of Kashmir. A major escalation with China over Ladakh could entangle Pakistan and widen the conflict. Bottom Line: Religious polarization is picking up amid the lockdown and could explode as containment efforts are eased. India is likely to experience an intensification of unrest from the Muslim minority. In addition to being frustrated by the economy, this group is being politically marginalized, and thus will become more restless and radicalized over time. Will Modi’s Popularity Persist? Modi remains extremely popular, but he has seen his pandemic popularity “bounce” come and go (Chart 14). He is credited for the early and aggressive response to the outbreak, but his approval rating may have trouble in the coming months and years as the economic aftermath unfolds. The positives for Modi are very clear. India’s economic woes this year will be blamed on the shock brought on by the pandemic even though the economy was in bad shape prior to that, washing away any bad memories from the country’s de-monetization and implementation of the new goods and services tax. Another positive for Modi: while states led by his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) were previously worse off in terms of unemployment rates, this situation reversed in April and May. Now states led by the opposition Indian National Congress (INC) are suffering the greatest in terms of job losses (Chart 15). In fact, the average unemployment rate for states led by the BJP fell in May. Chart 14Modi’s Popularity High, But COVID Bounce Gone Chart 15Opposition States Bear Brunt Of Unemployment The dichotomy in state unemployment is due to the heavier presence of industry in BJP-led states such as Gujarat, Karnataka, and Haryana. The exodus of migrants from these states reduced the size of the labor force, bringing down unemployment rates. By contrast, unemployment spiked in migrant workers’ home states such as Jharkhand, and Punjab, which are opposition-led. Moreover there’s been little effective political opposition to Modi’s handling of the pandemic. True, as with all federal systems, Modi faces pushback from the state governments, which argue that their funding is drying up. A major source of state funding comes from alcohol sales, fuel, and real estate. The latter two have collapsed amid the recession, while the federal government’s decision to ban alcohol sales during the lockdown weighed on state financing and catalyzed the political clash. Yet Modi has used the occasion to centralize control and make his case for stronger federal government. For instance, he has mandated that only the central government can produce, procure, import, or distribute COVID-combating materials and equipment, from personal protective equipment (PPE) to masks to ventilators, thus clipping states’ powers. From a structural point of view, India needs a stronger central government to pursue economic and strategic objectives. Since the pandemic is a challenge that requires a strong central response, Modi’s centralizing approach continues to receive a tailwind from public support. India has a relatively strong score on our COVID-19 Unrest Index when it comes to governance, especially in terms of voice and accountability and control of corruption. Modi’s centralization of power could weaken governance over time, but it is not an immediate concern for investors since the overriding problem in India is a lack of national coordination.4 Clearly, then, the risk to Modi is that unemployment, unrest, communal tensions, and conflict with Pakistan and China lead to political defeats that deplete his political capital in his second term and make him vulnerable to electoral losses at the state level and ultimately in the general election in 2024. At the moment he has sufficient political capital, but political risks are much higher for him than they were prior to COVID-19. If these risks mount, Indian equities will suffer, as the clear implication is a loss of Modi’s and the BJP’s high level of control over both federal and state governments. This would reduce India’s ability to execute policy. The lack of coherence would shake investors’ faith in India’s ability to accelerate reforms and economic development. Bottom Line: Modi’s popularity enjoyed a solid bounce from the crisis and remains very high. He is concentrating power into the federal government, demonstrating that it is capable of rising to India’s modern challenges. The risk is that governance could suffer as a result of the massive challenges to the economy and social stability in the wake of COVID-19. Investment Takeaways Chart 16Indian Equities Breaking Down Indian equities relative to emerging markets are hovering at the 12-year moving average, a critical technical point. If they break beneath this level then there is further downside. Indian equities have broken down relative to global equities (Chart 16). The breakdown occurred despite the collapse in oil prices, which normally would help Indian stocks since the country’s import bill runs to 5% of GDP (Chart 17). Oil prices will strengthen in the second half of the year as global supply-demand balances tighten on the back of OPEC 2.0 supply restraints. Our Commodity & Energy Strategy expects cartel discipline to persist this year. A spike in oil prices driven by production cuts will penalize Indian stocks relative to EM peers. However, we maintain a bullish outlook on India over the long run and tend to view major selloffs, from today’s levels, as an opportunity to buy on the dip. Major selloffs from today are a buying opportunity. Specifically, we see a buying opportunity in Indian pharmaceutical equities (Chart 18). India is one of China’s top competitors in producing both active pharmaceutical ingredients and finished drugs for the United States. While India’s fiscal stimulus will incentivize foreign companies to move supply chains out of China, the United States’ upcoming rounds of stimulus will offer incentives for companies to move out of China, particularly health care companies. While the US rhetoric will emphasize “Buy American, Hire American” onshoring, economic constraints will still motivate companies to work abroad. It is China that will bear the brunt of US protectionist impulses, not the world as a whole. Therefore India stands to benefit, particularly when it comes to pharma. Chart 17Oil Price Drop Brought Cold Comfort This Time Chart 18Go Long India Pharma Versus EM Pharma We also recommend investors go long Indian local currency bonds relative to emerging markets. These bonds are protected by the fact that foreign ownership and capital outflows are limited, as Ayman Kawtharani of our Emerging Markets Strategy observes (Chart 19). Chart 19Go Long Indian Local Currency Government Bonds Chart 20Rupee Will Trend Sideways From Here Easier monetary policy will weigh on the rupee, but it is already near the floor of the narrowing band in which its been trading against the dollar since 2018 (Chart 20). Thus odds are that the currency will move sideways over the near term. The primary risk to our view is Modi’s political survival. A collapse of Modi’s political capital and momentum – for any reason – would not deliver a new prime minister or ruling party with the same degree of capital and momentum. Rather it would produce either a weak Modi and BJP, or a challenger that will likely lack Modi’s single-party federal majority and state-assembly majority. If unemployment, social unrest, and communal tensions evolve in a way that fundamentally undermines the Modi regime – if Modi and the BJP suffered permanent damage from this year’s crises – then India’s overall economic policy uncertainty would rise on a long-term basis. The market would have to downgrade India’s economic outlook and earnings expectations to adjust. We remain bullish India on a secular basis, however, because there would remain an underlying national consensus on the need to prioritize economic development. That will not change anytime soon, as Modi has demonstrated to the public and the opposition that it is a winning formula.   Roukaya Ibrahim Editor/Strategist Geopolitical Strategy RoukayaI@bcaresearch.com   Footnotes 1 Upcoming state elections are a different story, but any stimulus will be local. 2 Pandya, Dhwani “Biggest Job Creator Short of Labor Amid Vast India Unemployment,” Bloomberg, May 6, 2020. 3 Muhammad Saad Khandalvi, leader of Tablighi Jamaat, has been charged with manslaughter after ignoring two notices to put a stop to an event hosted by the group at a mosque in New Delhi which started on March 3. The group claims to have ended the event prematurely upon learning of a national curfew on March 22, arguing that other non-Muslim religious gatherings are not facing the same charges. 4 The risk of centralization is that India’s governance could suffer over time. For example, the Prime Minister’s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund, chaired by Modi, has been criticized for its lack of transparency and for diverting resources from other efforts. Modi created a new fund when an older fund, the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund, already existed. Political patronage is clearly at work. Modi’s fund enjoys benefits that are unavailable to other relief funds, allowing overseas contributions and corporate donations to count toward the mandatory 2% of profits spent on corporate social responsibility.

Highlights When retail investors invest aggressively and central banks buy assets en masse, economic fundamentals take the back seat and momentum becomes king. Global risk assets are at a fork in the road: either they will relapse meaningfully as they have run well ahead of fundamentals or a budding mania will push global share prices to fresh new highs.   A budding mania is the basis behind our strategy of chasing momentum from this point on. Investors should adjust their strategy based on momentum in global stocks and the broad trade-weighted US dollar in the coming weeks. We are upgrading Chinese stocks from neutral to overweight and downgrading the Korean bourse from overweight to neutral within an EM equity portfolio. Feature Chart I-1Make It Or Break It Moment For US Dollar Global share prices have reached a point where they are no longer oversold. In turn, the trade-weighted US dollar has worked out its overbought conditions and is sitting on major defensive lines (Chart I-1). If the dollar relapses below its technical resistances, it will enter a bear market. Consistently, EM risk assets will enter a bull market. The trajectory of EM risk assets and currencies in the coming months will ultimately depend on what happens to the ongoing global FOMO (fear-of-missing-out) rally. We refer to it as a FOMO rally because both the DM and EM equity rallies have been taking place despite deteriorating corporate profit expectations, as we documented in our June 4 report. Why The FOMO Rally May Still Have Legs There are a number of reasons why this FOMO-driven rally could persist: Chart I-2Helicopter Money In The US First, the Federal Reserve is explicitly targeting higher asset prices, and to achieve this goal it is deploying its “nuclear” arsenal – printing money and monetizing public debt, lending to the private sector as well as buying corporate bonds. US broad money growth is at an all-time high (Chart I-2). Consequently, the risk of a full-blown equity bubble formation in the US cannot be ruled out. If this occurs, all EM risk assets will rally along with the S&P 500. US policymakers are throwing everything into the system to keep financial asset prices inflated. It seems that after any day that the S&P 500 sells off, the Fed or the US administration comes up with some sort of new measure to support the economy and asset prices. Historically, investors have placed a lot of weight on the Fed’s actions. Aggressive measures by the Fed have recently led investors to purchase stocks and corporate bonds, irrespective of the condition of the underlying economy. As a result, share prices worldwide have decoupled from corporate profit expectations (Chart I-3A and I-3B). If US policymakers succeed in lifting US share prices further, every investor will likely chase the rally and the US equity market will become a full-scale bubble. Chart I-3AGlobal Stocks Are Pricing In A Lot Of Good News Chart I-3BSurging EM Share Prices Amid Plunging Forward EPS Chart I-4Retail Investors Have Driven Up Trading Volumes At some point, the bubble will start cracking even if corporate earnings find their way back to a recovery path. When equities make up a large share of investors’ assets, any trigger could lead to marginal sellers outnumbering marginal buyers. As we discuss below, there are plenty of risks that could result in a trigger. Both retail and institutional investors are very averse to losses, and when the market begins to slide, investors will sell their shares simultaneously. The market will plunge. The Fed will be forced to buy stocks to avert the negative impact of falling share prices on the economy. In a nutshell, US equities and corporate bonds have become extremely dependent on the Fed. This might be good news in the short and medium term. Nevertheless, it is negative for the US in the long run. Second, when retail investors rush into the market and actively trade, fundamentals take the back seat. This is what has been occurring since March. Retail investors appear to be especially attracted to crushed or near-bankrupt US stocks as well as popular tech stocks. This is illustrated by the surge in turnover volumes on the Nasdaq as well as in Southwest Airline, Norwegian Cruise Lines and Chesapeake Energy stocks (Chart I-4). Yet the impact of their actions is not limited to these stocks. Stocks are fungible. When retail investors purchase shares of near-bankrupt companies at elevated prices (at higher than fundamentals warrant), institutional investors sell those stocks and move capital to other companies. In aggregate, the stock market index rises.  The ongoing retail investor mania is not solely a US phenomenon. It has become prevalent in many other countries. There are anecdotes that Japanese retail investors have been actively trading Jasdaq stocks, while Korean, Taiwanese and Filipino retail investors have been buying local shares en masse.1  The top panel of Chart I-5 illustrates that Korean individual investors have been accumulating stocks while foreigners have been selling out. In Taiwan, the share of individual investors in equity trading has been rising at the expense of domestic institutional investors (Chart I-5, bottom panel). Retail investors do not do much fundamental analysis, and it should not come as a surprise that share prices have decoupled from their fundamentals (profits) and have gained despite lingering massive risks. Retail investors appear to be especially attracted to crushed or near-bankrupt US stocks as well as popular tech stocks.  Third, the mania phase – the last and most speculative stage – in bubble formation typically lasts between nine and 18 months. This is based on the duration of the mania phase in the Nikkei (1989), the NASDAQ (1999-2000), oil (2008) and Chinese A shares (2014-‘15) (Chart I-6). The retail investor-driven equity mania began in March and is now three months old. If the duration of previous manias is any guide, the current rally could last another six months at least. Chart I-5Strong Retail Buying Is Also Evident In Korea And Taiwan Chart I-6How Long Mania Phase Lasted During Previous Bubbles? Chart I-7China A-Share Bubble: A Divergence Between Stocks And EPS The current equity mania resembles the one in China’s A-share market in 2014-‘15 in two aspects: (1) it is driven by retail investors and (2) it is occurring amid very underwhelming corporate profits. Chart I-7 demonstrates that Chinese A-share prices skyrocketed in H1 2015, despite a deteriorating corporate profit picture. It lasted for a while and ended with a bust without any policy tightening taking place. Finally, retail investors are not quick to give up when they lose money. Having acquired a taste for capital gains over the past few months, retail investors will likely become even more aggressive and will keep buying the dips. In such a scenario, institutional and professional investors may be forced to capitulate and chase risk assets higher. We are at a fork in the road: either retail investors will begin reducing their equity holdings soon, or institutional and professional investors will capitulate and start buying en masse. In the first scenario, stocks will tumble as retail investors rapidly head for the exits. The latter scenario on the other hand will push share prices considerably higher. This is the basis behind our strategy of chasing momentum from this point on. Bottom Line: All financial market manias eventually crash. However, if the market breaks out, the rally could endure for several months. Not chasing the rally will be very painful for portfolio managers. This is why even though we believe the current global equity rally has been a FOMO-driven mania, we recommend to play it if EM share prices break above, and the broad-trade weighted dollar relapses below, current levels. Plenty Of (Disregarded) Risks Chart I-8Number Of New Inflections Is Rising In Large EM Countries Even though global risk assets have been rallying, the global investment landscape remains poor, with plenty of risks. In particular: Geopolitical tensions are bound to rise between the US and China. Taiwan and its semiconductor sector are at the epicenter of the US-China technological and geopolitical standoffs. Timing any escalation is tricky, but Taiwanese stocks are not pricing in these risks. Further, odds are high that North Korea will test a strategic weapon, which will undermine the credibility of President Trump’s foreign policy. This is negative for the KOSPI and the Korean won. An escalation in US-China tensions encompassing technology, Hong Kong, Taiwan and the Koreas is negative for equity markets in China, South Korea and Taiwan alike. Together they account for about 60% of the EM MSCI equity benchmark market cap. Moreover, the China-India skirmish is a risk for Indian stocks. The number of new Covid-19 infections is rising in the majority of EM countries excluding China, Korea and Taiwan as demonstrated in Chart I-8. It will be hard to ameliorate consumer and business confidence and thereby boost spending in these countries amid a worsening trend in the global pandemic. Indeed, a second wave of the coronavirus now hitting Beijing is evidence that even the very efficient Chinese system is not able to prevent pockets of renewed infection outbreaks. This risk still looms large over many advanced and developing nations after the first wave subsides. The post-lockdown natural snapback in economic activity is creating a mirage of a V-shaped recovery. Like any mirage, it can last and drive markets for a while. However, it will eventually fade. When that happens, misalignments in financial markets will be ironed out rather abruptly. A snapback in economic activity around the world is natural following the unwinding of strict lockdowns. Nevertheless, the level of business activity remains very low. Going forward, persistent social distancing, the threat of a second wave and an initial substantial income drawdown will cap the speed of recovery in household and business spending around the world. In our February 20 report titled EM: Growing Risk Of A Breakdown, we contended that the most likely trajectory for Chinese growth is the one demonstrated in Chart I-9. It assumed the plunge in business activity would be succeeded by a rather sharp snap-back due to pent-up demand. However, this snapback would likely be followed by weaker growth in the following months. This is also our roadmap for the business cycles of many DM and EM economies. Even though on May 28 we upgraded our economic outlook for Chinese growth from negative to mildly positive, near-term risks for China-related plays remain. Consistent with the trajectory described above, the Chinese economy has been coming back to life, aided in large part by significant credit and fiscal stimulus (Chart I-10, top and middle panel). Traditional infrastructure investment has accelerated strongly (Chart I-10, bottom panel). Chart I-9Our Roadmap For China’s Business Cycle Chart I-10China: Money/Credit And Infrastructure Are Accelerating   Consequently, mainland demand for commodities has been very robust and raw materials prices have rallied. However, it remains to be seen if the recent strength in commodities purchases can be maintained going forward. A couple of our indicators and market price signals are also suggesting that caution is warranted in the near term with respect to China-related plays. First, our indicators for marginal propensity to spend among households and enterprises continue to deteriorate, even when May data points are included (Chart I-11). These indicators have been good pointers for consumer discretionary spending and business investment/demand for industrial metals, as illustrated in Chart I-11. Chart I-11Marginal Propensity To Spend Is Falling For Consumers And Enterprises Chart I-12Copper: Shanghai/London Premium And Prices   Second, the copper price premium in Shanghai over London has been a good coincident indicator for copper prices and has recently been flagging short-term risks to copper prices (Chart I-12). A rising Shanghai/London copper premium implies more robust demand in China, while a declining premium signals weaker copper demand in the mainland. Finally, share prices of property developers, industrials and materials in the onshore market have failed to advance much (Chart I-13). This fact does not corroborate that there is a strong recovery occurring in China’s broad capital spending outside infrastructure. Chart I-13Chinese Stocks Do Not Corroborate A Strong Recovery A similar message stems from the investable universe of Chinese stocks. We are using the sector indexes from the onshore market because they are less hyped by the global FOMO rally, and the number of companies included in these onshore sector indexes is larger than in the investable indexes. Bank share prices have done even worse (Chart I-13, bottom panel). Overall, near-term risks to China-plays remain and we are looking for a better entry point in the weeks and months ahead. The trend-setting US equity market is expensive, as we corroborated in our report on EM and US equity valuations a month ago. The forward P/E ratio stands at 22, using analysts’ 12-month forward EPS expectations that we believe are still optimistic. Global financial market correlations are presently high, and domestic conditions in EM ex-China, Korea and Taiwan are rather grim. If the S&P 500 relapses for whatever reason, there is little chance EM risk assets will avoid selling off. Bottom Line: Risks are abundant and fundamentals (profits, valuations, geopolitical risks, the ongoing pandemic) do not justify higher share prices. However, if a FOMO-driven rush into stocks persists, financial markets will continue ignoring fundamentals. Investment Strategy: Momentum Is Now King When retail investors invest aggressively and central banks buy assets en masse, it is not the time for fundamental analysis. Indeed, momentum becomes king. Investors should adjust their strategy based on momentum in global stocks and the broad trade-weighted US dollar in the coming weeks. Our composite momentum indicator for global share prices has risen to zero from extremely oversold levels (Chart I-14). Chart I-14Global Share Prices Are At A Critical Juncture If global and EM share prices break meaningfully above their 200-day moving averages and the US dollar breaks materially below its 200-day moving average (see Chart I-1 on page 1), our advice will be for investors to chase the rally. Even if DM and EM share prices break out, the odds are that EM stocks will continue underperforming DM ones. Hence, we continue to underweight EM in a global equity portfolio. The basis is that North Asian equity markets (China, Korea and Taiwan) are at risk of a heightened geopolitical confrontation between the US and China, as per our discussion above. Meanwhile, the remainder of EM is struggling with the pandemic. Hence, EM will continue to underperform, even if global share prices rise a lot. The current equity mania resembles the one in China’s A-share market in 2014-‘15 in two aspects: (1) it is driven by retail investors and (2) it is occurring amid very underwhelming corporate profits. That said, if global stocks and commodities prices break out and the greenback breaks down, we will close our remaining short positions in EM currencies and upgrade our stance on EM fixed-income markets from neutral to bullish. We have been receiving rates in Mexico, Colombia, Russia, India, China, Korea, Pakistan, Ukraine and Egypt, but have been reluctant to take on currency risk. Also, we upgraded our stance on EM credit markets to neutral on June 4. We will likely upgrade EM local currency bonds and EM credit markets further to “buy” if the above-mentioned breakouts transpire. Upgrade Chinese, Downgrade Korean Stocks Chart I-15DRAM And Korean Tech Stocks We are moving China from neutral to overweight and downgrading Korea from overweight to neutral relative to the EM equity benchmark. Regarding Korean equities, the risks are as follows: First, rising threats of North Korea testing a strategic weapon is negative for South Korea’s equities and currency. Second, DRAM prices and volumes are dropping. Chart I-15 shows that the DRAM revenue proxy is falling, a bad omen for Korean tech stocks that derive a lot of operating profits from DRAM sales.  Finally, the Korean bourse is heavy in old-economy stocks, which will experience a slow recovery in their profits from very low levels amid the enduring global trade downturn.  The reasons to upgrade Chinese investable stocks relative to the EM equity benchmark include: As we discussed above, the medium-term growth outlook for China is mildly positive due to the credit and fiscal stimulus Beijing has unleashed. The outlook for domestic demand is worse in many other developing economies. The credit and money bubble in China will inflate further and will pose a major challenge in the years ahead. That said, another round of major credit/money expansion will likely stabilize the system in the medium term. If the FOMO-driven mania continues, FAANG stocks will likely outperform, which will spread to similar stocks around the world. The Chinese investable index includes Alibaba, Tencent and other new economy stocks that will likely outperform the EM benchmark. If global markets correct and EM currencies drop, the Chinese RMB will appreciate relative to most EM exchange rates. This will help China’s equity performance relative to other EM bourses. Finally, if US-China tensions escalate and EM markets sell off, Chinese authorities will support share prices by deploying the national team and other government proxies to buy Chinese stocks. This will help the broad universe of Chinese stocks to outperform the EM benchmark. Chart I-16Long Chinese Investable / Short Korean Equities Bottom Line: We are upgrading Chinese stocks from neutral to overweight and downgrading the Korean bourse from overweight to neutral within an EM equity portfolio. Market-neutral investors should consider the following trade: long Chinese / short Korean equities (Chart I-16).   Arthur Budaghyan Chief Emerging Markets Strategist arthurb@bcaresearch.com   1     Please see the following articles: Coronavirus spawns new generation of Japanese stock pickers Stuck at Home, More Filipinos Try Luck at Stock Investing   Equities Recommendations Currencies, Credit And Fixed-Income Recommendations

Highlights China and India periodically fight each other on their fuzzy Himalayan border with zero market consequences. A major conflict is possible in the current environment – but it would present a buying opportunity. Chinese escalation with India would not have a negative impact on global trade and economy, unlike escalation with the US or its East Asian allies. If China gets into a major conflict with India, it is less likely to stage major military actions in the South China Sea or Taiwan Strait. It would reduce much more significant geopolitical risks. Go strategically long Indian pharmaceuticals. Feature India and China have engaged in their first deadly military clash since 1967. An Indian colonel and at least 20 troops died in fighting on June 15 in the Galwan Valley, Ladakh, where territorial disputes have heated up over the past month.At least 50 Chinese troops are estimated dead.1 Chart 1Regional Equities May Not Shrug Off War In Himalayas ... At First It was a minor incident. No shots were fired. Combatants used stones and knives and threw each other off cliffs. However, the occasion of the battle was a negotiation to de-escalate tensions, and talks have gone on since June 3. So that bodes ill. Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has not responded but China’s foreign ministry is making conciliatory remarks. Normally India-China border clashes occur during the summer, when weather permits, and do not last long and do not impact the rest of the world, either politically or financially. However, the structural and cyclical drivers of the conflict suggest it could escalate over the summer. A major escalation between nuclear powers is unlikely but could conceivably cause volatility in global financial markets. Global equity investors are focused on other things (COVID-19, global stimulus), but recent volatility suggests that Chinese, Indian, and Pakistani bourses could be vulnerable to any major military escalation (Chart 1). However, a Himalayan-inspired selloff would be short-lived and would present a buying opportunity. India-China tensions are far less relevant to global financial markets than China’s disputes with the United States in East Asia. If the US uses India as a pretext for tougher actions on China, then that is a different story. But it is unlikely for reasons explained below. Our base case strategic assessment of India remains the same: Chinese expansionism will pressure India to speed up economic development to gain greater influence in South Asia. India will also pursue better trade and defense relations with the United States and its allies in East Asia and the Pacific. We are tactically cautious on global equities, but strategically we expect equities to beat bonds and cyclicals to beat defensives. Selloffs stemming from Himalayan conflict will create buying opportunities for emerging market equities, especially India. The Drivers Of The Ladakh Skirmish India and China have a 2,170-mile border in the Himalayan mountains that is disputed in India’s northwest (Aksai Chin) and northeast (Sikkim; Arunachal Pradesh). These border disputes have simmered for decades and occasionally flare into violent incidents, usually meaningless. An India-China border war could occur, but is unlikely. Today’s clashes are mostly taking place in eastern Ladakh, as with disputes in 2013-14. Minor incidents have also occurred in India’s northeast (Naku La, Sikkim). These may be unrelated, but they may also suggest a broad India-China border conflict is in the works (Map 1). Map 1India And China Often Fight Over Undefined Himalayan Border When Ice Melts There is always a local spark for clashes along the Line of Actual Control. These tend to be triggered by infrastructure construction or military patrols that cross the countries’ various border claims. Typically China triggers the incident as it is always pouring more money and concrete into new structures to solidify its territorial claims, whereas India’s resources are more limited. However, in recent years India has grown more capable. Both sides may also be surging infrastructure spending amid the recession (Chart 2). Chart 2China No Longer Alone In Nation-Building In Himalayas Chart 3China's Slower Growth Jeopardizes Communist Party Legitimacy In the current dispute both sides claim the other broke the peace. Indian builders supposedly violated China’s space while working on the Darbuk-Shayok-DBO road which connects to an airfield near Galwan Valley, the site of the clash. But the Indian side argues that Chinese military forces have ventured several miles from their usual outposts and amassed major forces on their side suggesting they are preparing for a bigger effort to expand their control of territory. 2 We may never know who “started” it. There is no clear border and even the Line of Actual Control is hard to define.3 Investors should not confuse the proximate cause of this conflict for the underlying cause. There are structural and cyclical factors at work on both sides: 1. China’s declining domestic stability and rising international assertiveness. The crises of 2008, 2015, 2018-19, and 2020 have caused a hard break in China’s economic model. Slower trend growth jeopardizes the Communist Party’s long-term monopoly on power (Chart 3). The Xi Jinping administration has responded to each crisis by tightening the party’s grip and reasserting central Beijing control. This is true at home, in peripheral territories like Xinjiang and Hong Kong, and abroad, as in the South China Sea and the Belt and Road Initiative. Territorial disputes have flared up across China’s borders. India is no exception, with incidents in 2013, 2014, 2017, and now 2020 marking the change (Table 1). Table 1China’s Territorial Assertiveness Triggers Clashes With India The China-Pakistan Economic Corridor strengthens the alliance between these two countries and deepens India’s insecurities. India perceives China’s Belt and Road Initiative as a threat of economic and eventually military encirclement. In 2017, the Doklam dispute between China, Bhutan, and India – which lasted over two months – served to distract the Chinese populace from a major increase in US pressure on China’s periphery. That was President Trump’s “fire and fury” campaign to intimidate North Korea into entering nuclear negotiations (Chart 4). In 2020, China faces its first recessionary environment since the mid-1970s as well as rocky relations with the United States over trade, technology, Hong Kong, North Korea again, and possibly even the Taiwan Strait. It is a convenient time to turn the public’s attention to the Himalayas. Chart 4China's Last Dispute With India Occurred During US-North Korea Tensions 2. India’s emerging national consensus and international coming-of-age. India’s rise as a global power has accelerated since the Great Recession, especially after oil prices fell in 2014. Prime Minister Modi has won two smashing general elections with single-party majorities, in 2014 and 2019. His movement also maintains the upper hand in state legislatures, which is important given that India’s weak federal government cannot simply force structural reforms onto the country (Map 2). Modi’s electoral success reflects a deeper national consensus on the need for stronger central leadership, faster economic development, deeper international trade and investment ties, and pro-efficiency reforms such as the creation of a single market. The policy retreat from globalization benefits insular and service-oriented economies like India at the expense of mercantilist trading powers such as China. America’s pivot to Asia and “Indo-Pacific” strategy create a chance for India to attract investment as multinational corporations diversify away from China (Chart 5). Map 2Modi’s Political Capital At State-Level Chart 5India Attracts Investment As Supply Chains Diversify From China Chart 6US And India Fiscal Stimulus Enable Supply Chain Shift Out Of China In August 2019, after Modi’s big election victory, he launched an ambitious agenda of state-building. He converted the autonomous region of Jammu and Kashmir into two union territories under New Delhi: Jammu and Kashmir, and Ladakh. This change of status quo angered China and Pakistan, which felt their own territory threatened. Chinese territorial pressure could be retribution for these administrative reforms. China and Pakistan will also want to undermine Modi’s party in upcoming elections for the state assembly of Jammu and Kashmir. China’s territorial encroachments reflect its desire to gain control of the entire Aksai Chin plateau. India does not want China to gain such a strategic advantage at the head of the Indus River and valley. The global pandemic and recession reinforced these structural and cyclical trends by pushing both India and China to use nationalist devices to divert their populations from domestic ills. The use of fiscal stimulus across the world enables leaders to pursue risky strategic policies (Chart 6). There is also a tactical issue: India took over the chairmanship of the World Health Assembly in May, while the US is lobbying on behalf of Taiwan’s long desire to be represented in the World Health Organization in the wake of COVID-19. China is resisting this call and could be using Ladakh as a pressure tactic.4 How Far Will Sino-Indian Conflict Escalate? Reports suggest that India and China have reinforced troops in and near Ladakh and have brought more firepower and airpower into range.5 Some of this activity, on both sides, consists of seasonal military drills. So it is not certain that a build-up is occurring. China is less constrained and more capable of escalation than India. If China continues pressing its territorial advance, or if India tries to reclaim territory or take other territory in compensation, then the fight will expand. The conflict is taking place in rocky recesses at a far remove from the rest of the world, so there is a temptation to believe that any escalation can be controlled.6 This may be false and lead to tit-for-tat escalation. Table 2Military Balance: India Versus China In Himalayas Which side faces greater constraints? China is least constrained and most capable of escalation. Over the short run, China can utilize improved military command and capabilities in the area and can control the media and political response at home. Besting India would demonstrate that all Asian territorial claimants should defer to China. However, over the long run, aggression would cement the balance-of-power alliance between the US and India. India is more constrained than China, less capable of escalation: Modi has considerable political capital, but his conventional military advantage in this area is eroding and China has the higher ground from which to stage attacks (Table 2). India’s loss in the 1962 Himalayan war with China was a national humiliation. A repeat of such an event could destroy much of Modi’s mystique as a strongman leader and national savior. In the worst-case scenario, China would demonstrate superior military capability while the US and its allies would remain utterly aloof, leaving India looking both weak and isolated. Therefore India will engage in tit-for-tat military response while seeking diplomatic de-escalation. The US lacks interest in the dispute: Trump has already offered to mediate, presumably to demonstrate his deal-making skills again before the election. But the US does not have a compelling interest in this dispute and India does not want US mediation. If Trump takes punitive measures against China it will be for other reasons. Serious punitive measures require the stock market and economy to relapse, since at the moment Trump’s average approval rating is 43% and he hopes financial and economic gains will help him recover (Diagram 1). Diagram 1Odds President Trump Will Hike Tariffs On China Before US Election The above points suggest that China can afford to escalate if it wants to show India and the rest of Asia that the US is toothless and that China’s territorial claims in Asia should not be opposed. Since COVID-19, China has been aggressive in the South China Sea and Taiwan Strait, despite the fact that these areas bring economic risks. The Himalayas do not. The implication is that China’s risk appetite is large, particularly in territorial disputes, and driven by social and economic pressure at home. Investment Takeaways Because India and China (and Pakistan) have nuclear arms, and because the US could get involved, it is possible that a major escalation could occur and cause volatility in global financial markets. But it would not last long and no parties will use nuclear arms over Himalayan territorial disputes. A major conflict that results in a Chinese victory would subtract from Prime Minister Modi’s political capital and hence weigh on Indian equities, which have broken down badly since COVID-19 (Chart 7). The reason is that strong political support for Modi would enable India to continue making structural economic reforms that increase productivity. Chart 7Indian Equities Underperforming Since COVID-19 Chart 8India’s Path To Regional Primacy Lies Through Economic Opening And Reform In the long run, a major conflict, especially a humiliating defeat, would accelerate India’s attempts to improve national economic prowess for the sake of strategic security. Since India cannot achieve its strategic objective of primacy in South Asia merely through military power, it will need to do so through a stronger economic pull (Chart 8). This is an impetus for structural economic reform even beyond Modi. Hence our secularly bullish outlook on India. Indian pharmaceutical equities offer an investment opportunity (Chart 9). In an attempt to address land acquisition, which is one of the biggest constraints faced by companies looking to invest in India, New Delhi has announced that it is developing an area the size of Luxembourg to attract businesses moving out of China. The government reached out to over 1,000 US companies in April with incentives for them to move their facilities to India, with a focus on industries in which India has a comparative advantage, such as medical equipment suppliers, food processing units, textiles, leather, and auto part makers. Chart 9US And Indian Stimulus Policies Will Boost Investment In Indian Pharma While India is not as economically competitive as China, it could be attractive for non-strategic industries that would not want to relocate to the US but are looking to reduce uncertainty from US-China tensions. The next round of US fiscal stimulus is also likely to contain significant provisions that will incentivize companies to relocate from China, particularly in the medical and health care sector. For global investors, while a major Sino-Indian escalation could lead to short-term volatility, it would ultimately be a positive development if Beijing vented its nationalism on a strip of earth that is not globally relevant, rather than on the seas, which are highly relevant. Conflict between the US and China in East Asia is a far greater risk than Sino-Indian conflict. Indeed Chinese and American actions over the Taiwan Strait, North Korea, or the South and East China Seas are still far more likely than Sino-Indian tensions to affect global trade and stability and financial markets this year. The US could impose sanctions on Chinese tech and trade, a military incident could occur in the Taiwan Strait, North Korea could provoke US President Donald Trump into a new round of “fire and fury” that triggers a showdown with China, or the US and China could fight a naval skirmish in the South or East China Sea. None of these options is low probability, especially surrounding the US election. Over the short run, global investors should prepare for greater equity volatility, primarily because of hiccups in delivering new stimulus in the US, EU, and China, plus US domestic political risks and US-China-Asia strategic tensions. Stay long JPY-USD. Over the long run, a global growth rebound driven by massive global fiscal and monetary stimulus will drive the US dollar to weaken, global equities to outperform bonds, and cyclicals to outperform defensives. We remain long China-sensitive plays as well as infrastructure, cyber-security, and defense stocks. Strategically, go long Indian pharmaceuticals relative to the emerging market benchmark.   Matt Gertken Vice President Geopolitical Strategist mattg@bcaresearch.com Footnotes 1 The Guardian, "Soldiers fell to their deaths as India and China’s troops fought with rocks," June 17, 2020. 2 See Ashley J. Tellis, "Hustling in the Himalayas: The Sino-Indian Border Confrontation," Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, June 4, 2020. See also Mohan Guruswamy, "India-China Border Dispute: Is A Give And Take Possible Now?" South Asia Monitor, June 3, 2020. 3 The Treaty of Tingmosgang (1684) only specifies one checkpost, at the Lhari Stream near Demchok, leaving everything else to disputed Indian and Chinese claims. See Alexander Davis and Ruth Gamble, "The local cost of rising India-China tensions," June 1, 2020. 4 See Nayanima Basu, "India Isn’t Worried About Tension With China, Unlikely To Give In To US Pressure On Taiwan," May 13, 2020. 5 See Ren Feng and He Penglei, "PLA Xizang Military Command holds coordinated exercise in plateau region," China Military Online, June 15, 2020. See also "空降兵某旅积极探索远程兵力投送新模式 空地同步 奔赴高原". 6 The reason escalation is normally limited is because of the extreme difficulty of operating extended military operations and resupply at 13,000-feet altitude. Both sides have the ability to surge reinforcements and equalize the contest. The cost and difficulty of retaking lost territory is often prohibitive. And while India’s conventional military power may overbalance China in this region, China has the uphill advantage and has made leaps and bounds in operational capabilities in recent decades. In short, escalation is normally controllable. See Aidan Milliff, "Tension High, Altitude Higher: Logistical And Physiological Constraints On The Indo-Chinese Border," War On The Rocks, June 8, 2020.

Special Report

Highlights Our recalibrated model suggests that, if President Trump places a 25% tariff on all Chinese goods exports to the US, then the RMB should fall by 4% against the dollar from its current value. The RMB has been trending below its “fair value” in the past two years, but as US-China tensions escalate, the PBoC will likely allow the market forces to push the RMB lower. We continue to hold a long position in the USD-CNH, but recommend investors keep the position on a short leash. The key risk to this view is a broad-based dollar weakness. So far, the yuan has been resilient against a dramatic drop in the DXY. The more that the RMB deviates from its fair value, the more rapidly and strongly it could appreciate in the absence of further tariff hikes. Feature The strong probability of a re-ignited US-China trade war this year will place the RMB under downward pressure against the USD.1 Unlike in 2019 when China was trying to reconcile with the US to reach a trade deal, this year President Trump will encounter a much less compromising President Xi Jinping. Therefore, it is more likely that Beijing will use depreciation as a countervailing tool on, and even ahead of any additional tariffs on Chinese goods exports to the US.   The RMB would likely fall by 4% if the US was to boost import tariffs to 25% on all Chinese goods. We recalibrated our Equilibrium Exchange Rate Model to project the tactical (0-3 months) fluctuations in the RMB against the dollar, in different scenarios of tariff hikes. If President Trump is to raise the tariff rate to 25% on all US imports of Chinese goods, the RMB should fall by 4% against the dollar from its current value. On a cyclical time horizon (the next 12 months), however, the RMB will likely rebound. The RMB has been trending below its fair value against the dollar since the onset of the trade war in mid-2018, but the economic fundamentals that supported the dollar’s strength in the last two years have diminished. Even if a second wave of the Covid-19 pandemic materializes, but does not result in severe lockdown measures, the dollar as a countercyclical currency will be pushed lower as global growth continues to recover. The combination of a stronger global economy and weaker dollar should help strengthen pro-cyclical currencies, such as the RMB. A Recalibrated Model Based On The Economics Of Tariffs If the US were to impose further tariffs on Chinese exports, how much will the RMB fall against the dollar? According to our recalibrated Equilibrium Exchange Rate Model, if the US was to boost import tariffs to 25% on all Chinese goods tomorrow, then the RMB would likely fall by 4% to around 7.35 against the dollar2 (Chart 1A and 1B). That said, currency markets tend to undershoot, and market forces will likely push the RMB lower on the prospect of further escalation. More importantly, the PBoC will be less likely to lean against this weakness, since the lower in the exchange rate will buffet exports. Chart 1AUSDCNY Under Tariff Rate Hike Scenarios Chart 1BA Tariff Timeline The Evolution Of The US-China Trade War Tariff hikes typically catalyze an adjustment between two countries: either in the exchange rate to realign price competitiveness, in the quantity of tradeable goods, or a combination of the two.  Chinese goods exports to the US have only modestly decreased in the past two years from the pre-trade war year of 2017. Given that global trade has been mostly slowing since then, it signifies that the adjustment has largely occurred through the exchange rate (Chart 2). For a perfectly open economy, standard economic theory suggests that the exchange rate should move by the same percentage as the tariff increase to allow markets to clear. However, both the US and China do not have perfectly open economies. This suggests that the currency adjustment needed should be smaller.3 For example, as of 2019 only 16.7% of Chinese exports go to the US. A 25% tariff on all of these exports will lift overall export prices by only 4.2% (16.7*25%). This does not even take into consideration export substitution, and/or other factors that will influence tradeable prices. Chart 2Chinese Exports To The US Did Not Drop Much... Chart 3...Mainly Because China "Paid For" The Tariffs By Depreciating Its Currency Therefore, we recalibrated our model to reflect the assumed increases in both Chinese export prices and US import prices, rather than the pure increase in the US tariff rates. We also assumed that China will bear the brunt of the costs from the tariff hikes, which appears to have been the case in the past two years (Chart 3). The projections for where the USD/CNY rate is likely to settle in the next 0-3 months have closely tracked movements in the currency since July 2018. A Cyclical View On The RMB The RMB has depreciated by about 12% versus the dollar from its peak in April 2018, a non-trivial move for a currency that has been tightly managed. Rapid depreciations in the past two years have changed the valuation perspective of the RMB. Compared with our fair value estimates, the RMB has been undervalued in both real effective exchange rate terms and against the dollar. Chart 4The RMB Is Undervalued In Real Effective Terms... Our revamped Equilibrium Exchange Rate Model concludes that existing tariff rates should have the USD-CNY settle at around 6.98.  Currently, USDCNY is close to 7.1, suggesting that the market has been pricing in the risk of the US raising tariffs on China.  This means in the absence of further tariff hikes, the RMB will rebound and revert towards its fair value. Moreover, the RMB in real effective exchange rate terms has been undervalued compared with our fair value estimate, which is based on China's relative productivity trends and real bond yield differentials (Chart 4). With a 10-year bond in China yielding 2.8%, versus 0.7% in the US, interest rate differentials are likely to continue to structurally favor the RMB. Against the dollar, the RMB is also undervalued based on our relative purchasing power parity (PPP) models (Chart 5). Our PPP models make two crucial adjustments for an apples-to-apples comparison. First, the CPI baskets are broken into five subcomponents including food, shelter, health, transportation and household goods. Second, we run two regressions, one using the relative price ratios of the five subgroups (regression 1), and another using an aggregated price index weighted symmetrically across both the US and China (regression 2).4 Chart 5...And Against The Dollar Chart 6The PBoC Is Taking A More "Laissez-Faire" Approach Towards The RMB Depreciation It is true that valuation rarely matters in the near term and the market almost always over- or under-shoots from its "fair value" levels. The strength in the USD since early 2018 has also played a dominant role in the RMB’s depreciation. However, the RMB’s spot exchange rate has deviated from its fundamental equilibrium in the past two years. In contrast with the previous cycle, the PBoC does not appear to have intervened heavily in the offshore market to prevent excessive currency weakness. For example, in 2015/2016, the PBoC heavily clamped down on outflows. Offshore HIBOR rates also spiked, which is widely viewed as the PBoC's attempt to maintain exchange rate stability and to punish speculators by dramatically squeezing RMB liquidity in the offshore market. This time around, the PBoC is taking a more “laissez-faire” approach even though the RMB is weaker than back then (Chart 6). The key message is that longer-term investors should use RMB weakness to accumulate long positions, as any tariff-related weakness will cheapen an already attractive currency. Investment Conclusions In the near-term, a flare-up in the US-China trade war could trigger investors’ risk-off sentiment and economic fundamentals could be temporarily put aside. We continue to recommend a long position in the USD-CNH. Nevertheless, the more that the RMB deviates from its fair value, the more rapidly and strongly it will reverse to its fundamental equilibrium when tensions ease between the nations. The sharp reversal in the USD-CNY spot rate in the past three weeks illustrates this view (Chart 7). Thus, we recommend investors keep the long USD-CNH position on a short leash. Chart 7CNY/USD Below Its Long-Term Trend Chart 8US Money Supply Growth Way Outpaces China The economic fundamentals that have supported the dollar over the past two years are evaporating. The large overhang of China’s local currency money supply may exert structural downward pressure on the RMB exchange rate.5 However, money supply in the US has grown exponentially since the onset of the pandemic and has outpaced that of China (Chart 8). Interest rate differentials between the US and China will likely widen as well. Last week’s FOMC meeting made it clear that the Fed does not intend to raise rates through 2022. In contrast, the PBoC has a track record of normalizing monetary conditions about nine months after a trough in China’s nominal GDP growth (Chart 9). Chart 9The 'Old Faithful' PBoC Policy Normalization Pattern There is mounting evidence that the dollar is entering a new down cycle. Aside from the Fed’s dovish stance, there is mounting evidence that the dollar is entering a new down cycle. Typically, the dollar tends to run in long cycles, of about 10-years, with bear markets defined by rising twin deficits in the US. The reason is that as the Treasury issues more and more debt to finance spending, investors usually require a cheaper exchange rate to keep funding these deficits (Chart 10). Chart 10The Dollar And Cycles Chart 11USD A Counter-Cyclical Currency As such, in the next 12 months, barring a second wave of the pandemic that triggers severe lockdown measures, the dollar as a countercyclical currency will be pushed lower as global growth rebounds. This should help strengthen the RMB, given the USD/CNY rate tends to move with the dollar over cyclical periods (Chart 11).   Jing Sima China Strategist jings@bcaresearch.com Chester Ntonifor Foreign Exchange Strategist chestern@bcaresearch.com     Footnotes 1We assign a 40% probability that the US will revert to tariffs on China within the year. Please see China Investment Strategy Special Report "Watch Out For A Second Wave (Of US-China Frictions)," dated June 10, 2020, available at cis.bcaresearch.com 2As of June 15, 2020, USDCNY exchange rate is at 7.09. 3Please see Foreign Exchange Strategy Weekly Report "USD/CNY And Market Turbulence," dated August 9, 2019, available at fes.bcaresearch.com 4Please see Foreign Exchange Strategy Special Report "A Fresh Look At Purchasing Power Parity," dated August 23, 2019, available at fes.bcaresearch.com 5At around $3 trillion, China’s central bank foreign exchange reserves are equivalent to only 14% of all yuan deposits, and 11% of broad money supply Cyclical Investment Stance Equity Sector Recommendations

Dear client, It was my pleasure to join Dhaval Joshi, BCA’s Chief European Investment Strategist, this past Friday June 12, 2020 on a webcast he hosted titled: “Sectors To Own, And Sectors To Avoid In The Post-Covid World”. You can access the replay of the lively webcast here, where Dhaval and I debate how investors should be positioned in different time horizons. I hope you will find it both insightful and informative. Kind Regards, Anastasios Highlights Portfolio Strategy While we cannot time the exact equity market top, our sense is that we are more than fairly valued at the current juncture and the equity market has entered a speculative phase; thus the risk/reward tradeoff is poor in the near-term. We are compelled to put the S&P home improvement retailers index (HIR) on our downgrade watch list and institute a stop at the 10% return mark in order to reflect softness in our HIR macro model, a hook down in existing home sales and a high profit growth bar that sell-side analysts have set for the coming year. Recent Changes Our rolling 10% stop got hit last Tuesday and we monetized 32% gains since the reinstatement of the long S&P oil & gas exploration & production / short global gold miners pair trade.1 Feature Equities briefly erased all losses for the year early last week, but the Fed’s June meeting lacked any additional easing measures and served as a catalyst for a much needed breather – the fifth 5.3-7.3% pullback since the March 23 bottom – as the week drew to a close. While extremely easy monetary and fiscal policies remain the key macro drivers for the SPX, any hiccups in passing a new fiscal spending bill once the money runs out on July 31, carry enough risk to short circuit the equity market’s momentum and result in a shakeout phase. Importantly, given the recent speculative overshoot in equities, the cyclical return potential has diminished, and that is cause for concern. The ongoing COVID-19 catalyzed recession that the NBER last week confirmed commenced in February, the “second wave” risk, a flare up in the US/Sino trade war and more recently, civil unrest have dominated the news flow. However in all this chaos, the November election has slowly moved into the background, especially the SPX return implications during the 4th year of a Presidency. Chart 1 shows the profile of the S&P 500 during Presidential Election calendar years, going back to the 1950s. The solid green line shows the historical mean, and shaded areas denote the 10th and 90th percentiles of SPX performance. If history rhymes, the average profile of these 17 iterations suggests that more cyclical gains are in store for the S&P 500. Chart 1Do Not Ignore… Nevertheless, before getting carried away, a word of caution is in order. As we highlighted last week, a Biden win represents a risk to the SPX’s euphoric rise from the March lows, and could serve as a catalyst for a much needed pullback (Chart 2).2 Thus, according to our analysis if the 90th percentile proves accurate, then the SPX could trace this lower bound and fall 640 points or 20% (Chart 1). This is a key tail risk to our cyclically sanguine equity market view. Chart 2…(Geo)Political Risks Turning over to the reopening of the economy, while the SPX has now discounted a near fully functioning economy for the rest of the year and beyond (bottom panel, Chart 3), fixed income investors are not in total agreement. In fact, the missing ingredient in giving the green light for equities is a selloff in the bond market, which financials/banks are currently sniffing out on the back of the reopening of the economy. Until fixed income investors get on the same page as equity investors, the SPX will remain on shaky ground (top panel, Chart 3). We first turned positive on the cyclical prospects of the equity market in mid-March3 and cemented our conviction in our March 23 report presenting 20 reasons to buy stocks.4 Since then, the SPX has rocketed higher by 1000 points and overshot our 3,000 SPX target that we recently derived from three methods.5 While we cannot time the exact top and equities may have a bit more upside, our sense is that today, stocks are more than fairly valued and they have entered a speculative phase (Chart 4). Thus the risk/reward tradeoff in the near-term has shifted to the downside. Once these (geo)political risks get appropriately repriced via a higher risk premium, then the broad equity market will resume its cyclical upside march. Chart 3Bond Market Is Not Buying Stock Market’s Euphoria Chart 4Lots Of Good News Is Priced In This week we update one consumer discretionary subgroup and put it on our downgrade watch list. Put Home Improvement Retailers On Downgrade Alert We are putting the S&P home improvement retailers index (HIR) on downgrade alert and setting a stop at the 10% return mark in order to protect handsome gains for our portfolio since the mid-April overweight inception. HIR have catapulted to all-time highs both in absolute terms and relative to the broad market. Granted, this has been an earnings-led propulsion (top panel, Chart 5), however, we are uneasy that HD is a top ten holding in the S&P growth index (middle panel, Chart 5).6 Importantly, the first print in the real GDP release for Q1/2020 in late-April made for grim reading, with one notable exception: real residential investment. Business capex took it to the chin, but housing related outlays spiked over 20% on a quarter-over-quarter annualized basis, and signal that DIY same-store retail sales will likely prove resilient this summer (bottom panel, Chart 6). Chart 5An Earnings-Led Advance… Chart 6…Buttressed By Resilient Residential Investment… As a reminder, these Big Box retailers are highly levered to the ebbs and flows of residential investment and the latest GDP print should sustain the recent bid under S&P HIR prices (top & middle panels, Chart 6). Tack on the roughly $75/tbf jump in lumber prices since the early-April trough (not shown), and profits benefit from a dual lift: rising volumes and firming selling prices. The DIY avalanche is real and not likely to dissipate any time soon as a consequence of the coronavirus-induced working from home pervasiveness. Yet, HIR has run too far too fast and is due for a consolidation phase. One yellow flag is the recent fall in existing home sales, despite the all-time lows in mortgage rates brought back by the Fed’s ZIRP. The middle panel of Chart 7 shows that if the home sales decline continues in the summer months, then HIR sales will face stiff headwinds as remodeling activity suffers a setback. In addition, in previous recessions the inventory of homes for sale has surged, but at the current juncture only a small jump in inventories is visible (inventories shown inverted, top panel, Chart 7). Were that trend to gain steam, it could put downward pressure to high-flying HIR equities. Chart 7…But Soft Home Sales Are An Issue… Chart 8…And The Tick Down In Our HIR Model Is A Yellow Flag The industry’s net earnings revision ratio has climbed to multi-year highs and warns that analyst optimism is excessive, which is contrarily negative (bottom panel, Chart 7). Our macro driven HIR model does an excellent job in encapsulating all the moving parts and its recent tick down is worrisome (Chart 8). Nevertheless, given that this has been a profit-led advance, HIR have a large valuation cushion. The relative forward P/E is trading near a market multiple and below the historical mean (bottom panel, Chart 5). Netting it all out, we are compelled to put the S&P HIR index on our downgrade watch list and institute a stop at the 10% return mark in order to reflect softness in our HIR macro model, a hook down in existing home sales and a high profit growth bar that sell-side analysts have set for the coming year (middle panel, Chart 5). Bottom Line: While we remain overweight the S&P HIR index it is now on downgrade alert. We also set a stop at the 10% return mark in order to protect profits for our portfolio. Stay tuned. The ticker symbols for the stocks in this index are: BLBG: S5HOMI – HD, LOW.   Anastasios Avgeriou US Equity Strategist anastasios@bcaresearch.com     Footnotes 1     Please see BCA US Equity Strategy Insight Report, “Pocketing Gains In Oil/Gold Pair Trade” dated June 10, 2020, available at uses.bcaresearch.com. 2     Please see BCA US Equity Strategy Weekly Report, “Don’t Turn A Blind Eye To Geopolitical Risks” dated June 8, 2020, available at uses.bcaresearch.com. 3    Please see BCA US Equity Strategy Weekly Report, “Inflection Point” dated March 16, 2020, available at uses.bcaresearch.com. 4    Please see BCA US Equity Strategy Weekly Report, “The Darkest Hour Is Just Before The Dawn” dated March 23, 2020, available at uses.bcaresearch.com 5    Please see BCA US Equity Strategy Weekly Report, “New SPX Target” dated April 20, 2020, and “Gauging Fair Value” dated April 27, 2020, available at uses.bcaresearch.com. 6    https://us.spindices.com/indices/equity/sp-500-growth#data-constituents   Current Recommendations Current Trades Strategic (10-Year) Trade Recommendations Size And Style Views June 3, 2019 Stay neutral cyclicals over defensives (downgrade alert)  January 22, 2018 Favor value over growth April 28, 2020  Stay neutral large over small caps  June 11, 2018 Long the BCA Millennial basket  The ticker symbols are: (AAPL, AMZN, UBER, HD, LEN, MSFT, NFLX, SPOT, TSLA, V).