UK Housing Market Data Response Housebuilding (Q4 2016) Healthy levels of consumer confidence and steady economic growth encouraged housebuilders to ramp up production in Q4. And while we don’t think that pace of growth will be sustained, the outlook for... 23rd February 2017 · 1 min read
Middle East & North Africa Economics Update Tunisia’s economy set for a slow recovery in 2017-18 Tunisia’s economy picked up over the course of 2016 and, while growth is likely to strengthen a little further over the next couple of years, we expect it to remain sluggish at 2-3%. 23rd February 2017 · 1 min read
DM Valuations Monitor Is low volatility a bad omen for the S&P 500? Having traded sideways in January, strong economic data and growing anticipation of major tax reform have since driven the S&P 500 higher. Indeed, the index has risen by more than 3% since the start... 23rd February 2017 · 1 min read
Europe Data Response German GDP (Q4) & Consumer Confidence (Mar.) The second release confirmed that German GDP was growing at a healthy pace at the end of last year, driven mainly by consumer spending. While business surveys suggest that growth will accelerate... 23rd February 2017 · 1 min read
Latin America Economics Update Brazilian interest rates to continue falling sharply The statement accompanying the Brazilian central bank’s decision to cut the Selic interest rate by 75bp to 12.25% maintained an explicit easing bias but gave little away in terms of the future pace of... 23rd February 2017 · 1 min read
India Economics Update The importance of state elections The raft of state elections currently taking place in India is likely to have an important bearing on economic policy at the local level. But more significant, the outcome of the state elections – in... 23rd February 2017 · 1 min read
Australia & New Zealand Data Response Australia Private Capital Expenditure Survey (Q4) While there is some tentative evidence that non-mining business investment is rising, it certainly isn’t rising as fast as widely hoped. This doesn’t surprise us as we’ve been saying for a long time... 23rd February 2017 · 1 min read
Latin America Data Response Colombia GDP (Q4) The stronger-than-expected expansion in Colombian GDP in Q4 confirms that the worst of the country’s economic downturn has now passed. Higher oil prices should support a further gradual recovery over... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
US Housing Market Data Response Existing Home Sales (Jan.) Existing home sales in January saw the largest month-on-month gain in nearly a year, to take them to their highest level since early 2007. The post-Trump jump in mortgage applications will have helped... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
UK Commercial Property Update Is the business rate revaluation a game changer? For most firms, we suspect that any rise in business rates in April will be more manageable than recent headlines seem to imply. Nevertheless, the current confusion over the potential impact of the... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
Bank of Canada Watch Bank won’t move on interest rates for a while longer We expect the Bank of Canada to hold its policy interest rate at 0.50% next week. Although core inflation and wage growth have slowed, activity and business confidence data have been more positive... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
US Chart Pack Rebound in inflation gives Fed less wiggle room The rise in CPI inflation to a five-year high of 2.5% in January was principally due to a surge in gasoline prices, which appears to have been partly reversed in February. Nevertheless, with headline... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
US Economics Update New trade balance calculation would make little sense The changes to the official trade statistics apparently being considered by the Trump administration may bolster the case for renegotiating trade deals, but they would give a distorted picture of... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
Emerging Europe Chart Pack A strong start to the year The latest data suggest that the economies of Emerging Europe got off to a good start to the year. Our regional aggregates of the manufacturing PMIs and the European Commission’s Economic Sentiment... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
Africa Economics Update South Africa’s fiscal squeeze continues South Africa’s budget for the 2017/18 fiscal year, which envisages a fiscal squeeze of around 0.5% of GDP, looks a bit more plausible than previous budget projections. But it now seems that domestic... 22nd February 2017 · 1 min read
