Saudi Arabia’s budget deficit widened further at the start of this year and, for now at least, the government seems comfortable with maintaining the loose fiscal stance and issuing more debt. If oil prices fall back further as we expect, however, a return …
7th May 2024
The rebound in prime retail rents is set to wane this year. But we think prime rents on luxury high streets will continue to outperform those of mass markets in the coming years. The return to rental growth on high streets in 2023 after three years of …
The sharp rise in the price of carbon under China’s Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) this year, to a record high, underlines that Beijing sees carbon pricing as a key part of its emissions-reduction toolkit. Although the price of polluting in China is likely …
The RBA’s decision to leave rates on hold at its meeting today suggests that there is a high bar for any further tightening of monetary policy. Indeed, the Board seems keen on minimising the collateral damage to the economy from its war on inflation. On …
Bank’s easing credit conditions amid soft demand The second-quarter Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey revealed that, a year after the regional banking crisis, only a modest net share of banks are still tightening lending standards. The Net percentage of …
6th May 2024
Despite the correction in equity markets over the past month, risk premia generally remain low across financial markets. While we expect this to continue as an AI-driven bubble inflates in equity markets, this Update explores four areas that could …
3rd May 2024
Inflation in Norway has been falling faster than Norges Bank expected for some time, but with the core rate still a long way above target, today’s communications show that policymakers are not counting their chickens. While they now seem to envisage …
The latest manufacturing PMIs suggest that global industry continued to recover at the start of Q2, but that this was entirely due to higher output in emerging markets, while activity remained much weaker in advanced economies. Meanwhile, the increase in …
2nd May 2024
The EM manufacturing PMI for April showed that industry continued its strong start to the year through to the beginning of Q2. At a regional level, the narrative was largely unchanged: India remains the star performer, while industry in Central Europe …
Many central banks are concerned about the fact that services inflation has remained too high. But we think the risks in Switzerland are skewed to the downside and, in our view, outweigh the upside risks from goods prices. This leaves us comfortable with …
Our forecast that the Bank of Canada will cut interest rates earlier and more aggressively than the Federal Reserve means that the loonie is likely to depreciate, but we doubt the move will be large enough to push up imported goods inflation …
The Riksbank is likely to kick off its easing cycle next week by cutting its policy rate from 4.0% to 3.75%. Beyond that, our forecast is for 100bp of rate cuts this year which is substantially more than investors are anticipating, as inflation looks on …
With downtowns generally suffering most from the growth in remote work, the hardest-hit cities such as San Francisco are now seeing this impact other revenue streams too, not least tourism. While there are promising signs that conversions from office to …
Euro-zone construction output picked up at the beginning of this year but we don’t think this was the beginning of a sustained rebound. Surveys suggest that output will decline in the next few months, and while rate cuts should support a recovery later in …
Slight hawkish shift at the CNB, but rates to fall further than most expect The communications accompanying the decision by the Czech National Bank (CNB) to cut its policy rate by 50bp again today (to 5.25%) were slightly more hawkish than expected, but …
While Chinese lending to Africa has fallen sharply from its peak last decade, China will remain a big player in the region’s external financing – particularly if some of the foreign exchange generated by China’s enormous trade surplus is recycled in …
Korea is one of the few countries in the region where inflation is still above target. However, with economic growth set to slow and the government stepping up efforts to bring food prices down, we expect the headline rate to fall back to target by the …
On Tuesday we held a Drop-in on the outlook for the German economy. This Update summarises the key points that we discussed and answers some of the questions that we received during the event. 1. Do the Q1 GDP data mean Germany is out of recession? The …
We envisage cyclical sectors generally continuing to outperform defensive ones in the S&P 500 through the end of 2025. That reflects our view about the economic outlook; our expectation that hype around artificial intelligence (AI) will grow; our forecast …
The weakness in euro-zone investment in Q1 highlights that the pricing correction to date has not been enough to entice investors back to the sector. Lower market interest rates will support the recovery in H2, but we expect further rises in property …
Rapid growth in unit labour costs poses an upside risk to core inflation in many advanced economies. However, firms’ pricing power is weakening and we think that it will continue to do so. As a result, higher labour costs will not be passed on in full and …
The PMIs from Emerging Asia remained weak in April. We think manufacturing activity across most of Asia will remain subdued in the near term but output in Taiwan and Korea is likely to hold up better than that in the rest of the region. The weighted …
Fed biding its time Fed Chair Jerome Powell argued in his post-FOMC press conference that, despite the stickiness of inflation in recent months, additional interest rate hikes were still “unlikely”. Moreover, while he admitted that the strong start to the …
1st May 2024
Dollar’s strength not a threat to US economy The dollar’s rise is attracting a lot of attention, but is nowhere near big enough yet to have any significant impact on US inflation, although it does appear to be weighing on exports. In real trade-weighted …
Chinese policymakers won’t risk reliving the turmoil of 2015 by engineering a sudden devaluation of the renminbi . They may allow the currency to weaken gradually over the coming years to help industry deal with oversupply or to offset the impact of new …
The March JOLTS data showed clearer signs that labour market tightness is continuing to ease. Slower downward progress in wage growth could be concerning, but for now it still appears to be moving broadly in line with the forward-looking indicators, which …
House prices continue to temper their gains The housing rebound that began early last year continued to lose momentum in April. With affordability likely to remain stretched for the foreseeable future, house price growth will only ease further in the …
We think that the recent weakness in the Mexican peso was partly a symptom of stretched positioning. Given that risk premia still appear unusually low and the outlook for the “carry trade” is gradually worsening, we think that the peso will depreciate …
30th April 2024
The anti-dumping duties that the EU is likely to impose on Chinese imports in the coming months will have little macroeconomic impact. But more goods will be targeted in the next couple of years with significant implications for some sectors and …
China’s PMI surveys for April suggest the economy continues to grow at a faster pace than a few months ago which is providing support for commodity demand. Today’s Politburo statement signalled that the policy support that has lifted the economy will be …
The Polish government’s white paper on Monday set out a scathing review of the previous government’s fiscal record and highlighted the challenges facing the public finances, but if we’ve learned anything from the report it is that the government will take …
Longstanding turmoil in Mexico’s state-owned oil company, Pemex, alongside newly announced export cuts, raise questions about the outlook for Mexico’s oil output. But it will not be a large enough factor to alter the global oil market balance. What’s …
This report was first published on Tuesday 30 th April covering the official PMIs and the Caixin manufacturing PMI. We added commentary on the Caixin services and composite PMIs on Monday 6 th May. A touch softer but recovery still intact, for now The …
José Raúl Mulino, the front-runner in Panama’s presidential election scheduled for Sunday, has pledged to reinvigorate growth. But as we’ve been arguing for some time, the economy’s time as Latin America’s growth star is coming to an end. If anything, …
29th April 2024
Trump, the Fed, and the dollar Most of the major policy initiatives being suggested by Donald Trump’s campaign would be inflationary; whether it’s narrowing the trade deficit via tariffs or a dollar devaluation, curbing immigration or, now we learn, …
The wide divergence in global office market performance to-date has been driven by significant differences in the return to office and the impact that has had on occupiers’ leasing decisions. US markets have been the major losers, while those in …
The different treatment of prices collected annually is a key reason why the quarterly CPI measure rose much faster last quarter than the Monthly CPI Indicator had indicated. While it’s possible to correct some of the shortfalls of the MCI, it can’t be …
The Ministry of Finance may have intervened earlier today by selling FX reserves to halt the sharp fall of the yen. However, the economic case for foreign exchange intervention is much weaker now than it was in 2022, when the MoF last sold dollars to …
The US dollar is ending the week a touch softer against most currencies despite another set of hotter-than-expected US inflation figures. But the main story in currency markets this week is the ongoing drop in the Japanese yen, which hit a new low for the …
26th April 2024
While the headline of the Q1 NCREIF NPI data (-0.9% q/q total return) suggests we could be near the end of the price falls, we think this simply stored up bigger falls for the rest of the year. The growing share of underwater loans, as well as the far …
We think the recent recovery in the share prices of some of the ‘Magnificent 7’ is a sign that the earlier pull-back in their collective performance wasn’t a harbinger of a far bigger correction in the NASDAQ 100. On the contrary, we suspect that index …
While overall surveyor sentiment remains negative, the Q1 RICS survey appeared to show a divergence in views between respondents of where in the cycle the market currently is. We think the apparent differences in views stem from the growing discrepancy …
The continued decline in core inflation will make it difficult for Norges Bank to stick to its current guidance that it will leave interest rates unchanged until Q4. We suspect that the Bank will change its forward guidance next week to acknowledge the …
The Bank of Japan is getting more confident in meeting its inflation target on a sustained basis and signalled that inflation wouldn’t have to overshoot for policy to be tightened further. Nonetheless, policy rate hikes will become difficult to justify …
The plunge in inflation in Tokyo in April was mostly due to a sharp fall in high school tuition fees and the provision of free school meals. The impact of those policy changes on nationwide inflation will be much smaller and they won’t affect the Bank of …
The US dollar would have to appreciate a lot further before having significant effects on the global economy and financial system. A key risk to watch for is the widening policy divergence between the US and Asia leading to a major depreciation in the …
25th April 2024
The latest RICS survey suggested that there was a further improvement in occupier and investment demand at the beginning of 2024. However, the big picture was one of a very weak market, reaffirming our view that rent growth will slow further and the …
The Q1 RICS commercial survey provided further evidence that occupier demand has turned the corner, with demand ticking up in the industrial and office sectors. But with availability still elevated, office and retail rents are expected to decline over …
Foreign-born workers have been entirely responsible for the post-pandemic recovery in employment. But a gradual rise in labour market participation and a moderation in net migration may mean the share of UK-born employment starts to rise again. The risk …
A later start to Fed rate cuts than we anticipated will push the fall in mortgage rates and recovery in activity into the second half of the year. But as we think that the Fed Funds rate will eventually be cut by more than markets have currently priced …
