BoE Watch MPC to keep the printing press fired up all year The Bank of England has much more work to do. It will probably start by announcing £100bn more quantitative easing at the meeting on Thursday 18th June, and we expect additional expansions in QE over... 11th June 2020 · 8 mins read
Europe Economics Focus TARGET2 imbalances set to balloon TARGET2 imbalances are set to rise to record levels over the year ahead on the back of the ECB’s planned wave of asset purchases. While this may be dismissed by some as a benign and technical side... 11th June 2020 · 13 mins read
US Economics Update Fed takes first steps to strengthen forward guidance The Fed left its policy stance broadly unchanged at the conclusion of today’s FOMC meeting, but it did strengthen its forward guidance a little – by publishing interest rate projections that show... 10th June 2020 · 3 mins read
Bank of Japan Watch Bank may expand lending programmes further The Bank of Japan has already done a lot to ensure the availability of funding of non-financial firms, but we suspect it may go a little further at the upcoming meeting. 9th June 2020 · 7 mins read
India Economics Update MPC minutes suggest further loosening likely The minutes of the Reserve Bank’s late May policy meeting – in which it trimmed both the repo and reverse repo rates – show that the MPC has become markedly more bearish on the outlook for economic... 8th June 2020 · 2 mins read
Nordic & Swiss Economics Weekly SNB gets the chance to regroup; Norway picking up The positive policy moves out of Europe have weighed on the Swiss franc and has ratcheted down the pressure on the SNB. Meanwhile, Norway’s economy appears to have clawed back about half of what was... 5th June 2020 · 6 mins read
Europe Economics Weekly Activity still depressed, policymakers step up support Data published this week added to evidence that economic activity in the euro-zone is slowly resuming after a catastrophic April, but that it remains well below “normal” levels. Against this backdrop... 5th June 2020 · 6 mins read
Europe Economics Update ECB meets high expectations for now The ECB’s decision to increase the size and duration of the PEPP should sustain the positive sentiment towards the euro-zone in the near term and reinforce the sense that, for now, European... 4th June 2020 · 3 mins read
UK Economics Focus Another decade of ultra-loose monetary policy The swift and significant response of the Bank of England to the coronavirus crisis has prevented a financial crisis, but we think the Bank will need to do much more than the markets currently expect... 4th June 2020 · 31 mins read
Bank scales back its liquidity operations The Bank of Canada made no new policy announcements today and instead scaled back some of its liquidity operations. But with its focus now shifting to “supporting the resumption of growth”, we think... 3rd June 2020 · 3 mins read
US Fed Watch Fed still has more policy options The Fed has several different policy options for putting downward pressure on long-term interest rates at the upcoming FOMC meeting, which concludes on Wednesday 10 th June. But with yields already... 3rd June 2020 · 10 mins read
Europe Economics Update Breakdown of ECB bond purchases reassuring The ECB has been purchasing a disproportionate share of Italian government bonds, but they are less heavily skewed towards Italy than we had anticipated. This in turn means that there may be less risk... 2nd June 2020 · 2 mins read
Africa Economics Update South Africa: how low can rates go? A look at South Africa’s recent history would suggest that the monetary easing cycle has further to run. We now expect an additional 75bp of cuts in the coming months, taking the repo rate from the... 2nd June 2020 · 3 mins read
Australia & New Zealand Economics Update Australia - RBA to expand quantitative easing soon The RBA sounded cautiously optimistic when it left policy settings unchanged today, but we still think that it will expand government bond purchases soon. 2nd June 2020 · 3 mins read
Nordic & Swiss Economics Weekly Repo rate cut in the pipeline The fact that the Swedish economy grew a touch in Q1 adds to signs that the country has enjoyed some economic benefit from its light-touch lockdown. However, exports probably won’t save the day again... 29th May 2020 · 6 mins read
UK Economics Weekly Slow path to normality, still on track for more QE The government’s plans for a progressive opening up of non-essential stores in June suggest that the low point for the economy is behind us. But with the damage caused by the lockdown measures likely... 29th May 2020 · 5 mins read
