Category: Investment Outlook
The return of the central bank put?
7 June 2019Stock markets had a very good week – for all the wrong reasons. Economic data reports confirmed that 2018’s US economic expansion is rapidly decelerating towards outright stagnation as companies appear to batten down the hatches...
Bond rally musings…
31 May 2019It all seemed to make a lot of sense to the media commentators this past week: government bonds rallied and equity markets fell because investors no longer expect a return of meaningful global economic growth during 2019, and...
It is getting warmer?
24 May 2019Unfortunately this headline is not intended to suggest that things are getting better, but rather that Donald Trump’s trade war is heating up. In a way I feel reminded of the Cold War between the US and the USSR in my youth,...
Market support for Trump or unwarranted equanimity?
17 May 2019A little over one week into the escalation of the US-China trade wars, stock markets have calmed and even made a partial recovery from last week’s sell-off. Globally, stock markets are now trading around 3.5% below their highs,...
Geopolitics re-enter market stage
10 May 2019Just as markets were trying to prove that they have regained some rational balance when they shrugged off central banks’ rejection of further monetary support, geopolitical tensions returned with vengeance. Perhaps it was naïve...
Central banks disappoint expectations
3 May 2019Last week we wrote that stock markets faced being challenged by the decline of a number of stimulating aspects that had been regularly named as the drivers of the 2019 recovery. The most crucial one being central banks’ assurances...
Waning market stimuli put stock markets on notice
26 April 2019A pleasant Easter break has been followed by new highs for US equity indices. And yet, it has been a less comfortable week for professional investors. The tailwinds blowing the 2019 stock market bounce-back are waning. Rebounding...
Spring time from here?
18 April 2019It is quite incredible how much investor sentiment has changed over the past 4 months. At Christmas, equity markets had suffered a decline from their September highs, which had many market commentators suggesting that the end...
Brexit in-limbo aside, sentiment is improving
12 April 2019Even though our prediction that Brexit would neither happen on 29 March nor 12 April has turned into reality, there seems little point in celebrating. Yes, the immediate threat of a cycle-ending shock event to the pan-European...
Choppy bull market
8 April 2019Frustrating political divisions have drowned out the 10th anniversary of what many have called the most unloved equity bull market in history. Broad based equity market investors (those who held their nerve) have enjoyed annualised...