Asia Economics Update Australia's monetary tightening has further to go The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) held its cash rate at 4.50% today, as expected. The external risks have increased but the RBA is still upbeat about the local outlook. GDP growth is forecast to... 6th July 2010 · 1 min read
China Economics Update Slowdown set to continue, market concerns to linger Current concerns about China’s slowdown are more justified than the previous fears of overheating. The government will probably loosen policy towards the end of the year, helping to maintain growth at... 6th July 2010 · 1 min read
UK Commercial Property Update Income security holds up, but weak economy is a lingering threat With the economy in recession for much of 2009, the latest data from Strutt & Parker and IPD suggest that landlords fared reasonably well last year, retaining a high proportion of tenants and in many... 6th July 2010 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Update Euro-zone break-up now more likely than not We have come to the conclusion that the balance of probabilities has swung against the euro-zone surviving in its present form. We have been brought to this point by our analysis of the problems of... 6th July 2010 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Focus Is Italy Europe’s ticking time-bomb? Perennially weak growth and a mountain of government debt mean that the Italian public finances are a potential time-bomb waiting to explode. Indeed, we think the size of the Governments debts will... 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
Japan Economics Weekly A mid-year progress report Looking back over the first half of the year, we have been right to be relatively bullish on the strength of the economic recovery in Japan. However, the yen has remained stronger and Japanese... 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
UK Economics Weekly OBR too optimistic on jobs Already we’re starting to get a feel for just how nasty the effects of the looming cuts in government spending will be. The OBR last week revealed that it expects over 600,000 public sector job cuts... 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
Europe Economics Weekly Banking strains won’t ease soon On the face of it, there were some encouraging signs last week that the euro-zone banking system is becoming less reliant on the ECB for funding and is switching to borrowing from more conventional... 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
Asia Economics Update Indonesia set to hike rates later this year Bank Indonesia (BI) left rates at 6.50% today, as expected. The economic upswing will stay strong but the high level of the rupiah is helping to hold down prices. Nevertheless, inflation will probably... 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
UK Data Response CIPS/Markit Report on Services (Jun.) June’s UK CIPS/Markit report on services provided further evidence that the recovery in the largest sector of the economy has lost momentum since the start of the year. 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
Emerging Europe Economics Update IMF deal a tentative step in the right direction for Ukraine The financial markets’ luke warm endorsement of Ukraine’s new IMF deal is probably justified. While a new IMF programme is good news in theory, in practice its success will depend on whether or not it... 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
Asia Economics Weekly The first Bank of Korea rate hike is close The Bank of Korea (BoK) meets this week and the decision whether to hike or not looks to be finely-balanced. We expect the policy rate to be unchanged at 2.0%, although the chance of a July move is... 5th July 2010 · 1 min read
UK Housing Market Chart Pack Outlook weakens in the latest data (Jul 10) The housing market data continued to send mixed messages last month. Activity measures remained subdued but did not typically weaken any further. House prices rose on some indices and fell on others... 2nd July 2010 · 1 min read
Asia Economics Update More India rate hikes on the way Today’s unscheduled Reserve Bank of India (RBI) rate hikes are a sensible and not unwelcome move. India’s economic upswing is strong and price pressures are already uncomfortably high. Further... 2nd July 2010 · 1 min read
