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US August jobs – porridge tepid and cooling
Markets weren’t expecting much from the August non-farm employment data and they didn’t disappoint. While average wage growth remained solidly above +3%, the underlying rate of private sector job growth slipped back to an anaemic +64k, with +15k of this coming from temporary help. Although comfortably ahead of the level of contraction that would signal […]
Continue readingUS GDP growth too strong in Q2?
Having bumped up the reported Q1 GDP growth numbers, the US administration now seems content to push a (modestly) slower growth narrative in order to support the current dovish Fed. As with the non-farm payroll seasonal adjustments, the GDP numbers are becoming increasingly unreliable as a true indicator of current economic growth and more a […]
Continue readingECB hopium
“substantial monetary policy stimulus remains essential to ensure the continued build-up of domestic price pressures over the medium term.” So says Sig Draghi in yesterday’s release of the ECB’s 2018 annual report and so much for any doubt that the ending of the asset purchase programme (AAP) in December would actually herald a return to […]
Continue readingMarket algos chasing Central Bank intervention, rather than anticipating it
Markets are going with the ‘flow’, because that’s the only way to trade these algo-driven markets. The new Fed chairman flip-flops from hawk to dove while the ECB hint at following suit (ahead of its May parliamentary elections) and the Chinese unleash another Tsumani of credit. Equity valuations meanwhile recoup the Q4 lost ground, notwithstanding […]
Continue readingEngineering a ‘Santa Rally’ in oil, but what then?
If the price of continued US support after the Khashoggi murder was the lower oil price, then it must rank as one of the most expensive assassinations of journalist in history, with Saudi Arabia’s gross oil production revenues down almost $2bn per week. The attempt to resurrect his political reputation at the G20 meeting was […]
Continue readingWar by other means – interest rates
War by other means? Forget the South China sea, Syria or Korea. If you haven’t noticed, the EU and China are locked in a high stakes game of chicken with the US over control of the World’s reserve currency, where the weapon of choice are interest rates. While much has been made of Trump’s attempts […]
Continue readingUS adds +205k jobs in July – normally a positive for the US dollar, but now?
The problem of communicating a softening macro outlook is that it lowers interest rate expectations which in turn is a buy signal for not just investors, but also recruiters. So while the IMF cut its US GDP expectations for 2017 and 2018 by -20bps and -30bps respectively (both now to +2.1%) and currency markets have ‘drumfped’ […]
Continue readingYellen does virtuous – 5 years too late!
Confused? Well you should be be if you’ve been believing the usual output from the Federal Reserve. Contrary to the narrative of robust US economic growth and tightening labour markets requiring a normalisation of interest rates, things aren’t quite as rosy as Ms Yellen had been suggesting. Behind the increasingly absurd non-farm payroll data with […]
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