Santander | It is one of the first headlines from last night’s FOMC minutes. Fed staff members go from assigning a near 50% probability, to now forecasting a mild recession. With the Fed also nearing the end of the cycle, it is no surprise that some dissenting voices are beginning to appear, opening the door to new bouts of volatility that have not favoured the credit market (MOVE/Main correlation of…
Renta 4 : European stock markets open almost flat (Eurostoxx futures -0.2%, S&P futures 0%), on a day in which the main reference will be the US March inflation data (2:30pm). The market expects further moderation in headline CPI (5.1%e vs 6% year-on-year), but a rebound in core CPI (5.6%e vs 5.5% previously) after five consecutive months of decline from a peak of 6.6%. We will see its impact on…
Alicia García Herrero (Natixis) | Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva is currently in Beijing with a huge official and business delegation. His goals are clear: first and foremost, bringing growth opportunities to Brazil, whose economy has been battered by the Covid pandemic. Brazilian exports of commodities into China have ballooned since Beijing’s fiscal binge in 2008 that led to pent-up demand for commodities. More recently, Brazil’s large lithium reserves,…
Bankinter | CPI falls back in March to +0.7% year-on-year from +1.0% and Industrial Prices remain negative at -2.5% year-on-year. This is the lowest CPI reading since September 2021 and Industrial Prices (IPP) since June 2020. The CPI Underlying Rate stands at +0.7% year-on-year from +0.6% previously. Analysis: Consumer and producer price inflation remains at exceptionally low levels in China. CPI has remained below the government’s target of +3% for…
Morgan Stanley | The probability of recession especially in the US has increased for most investors in recent weeks. Indeed, our analyst Ellen Zentner has revised her growth estimates downwards (on a 4Q/4Q basis): -10bps for 2023 (to 0.3%) and -20bps in 2024 (to 1%). Even in the case of avoiding technical recession, the impact on the labour market would be unavoidable: the macro team expects new jobs to be…
Alicia García Herrero (Natixis) | China’s so-called Two Sessions, the country’s most important annual political gathering, marked a transition this year. Held in early March, it included the final work report – or summary of government business – delivered by outgoing Prime Minister, Li Keqiang, who after two five-year terms as China’s prime minister, handed over to Li Qiang. Against this backdrop, Li Keqiang’s 2023 work report was blissfully short,…
Pablo Fernández | We sent a short email (see exhibit 1) on March, 2023 to more than 15,000 email addresses of finance and economics professors, analysts and managers of companies obtained from previous correspondence, papers and webs of companies and universities. We asked about the Risk-Free Rate (RF) and the Market Risk Premium (MRP) used “to calculate the required return to equity in different countries”. By March 31, 2023, we…
Link Securities | China’s official advance manufacturing activity index, the manufacturing PMI, came in at 51.9 in March, above the 51.6 expected by the analysts’ consensus, although it was below the 52.6 of the previous month. We recall that a reading above 50 points indicates expansion of activity from the previous month, while a reading below that level indicates contraction of activity. Most components decelerated after February, although production, new…
Link Securities | The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) reported yesterday that US crude oil inventories fell by 7.489 million barrels in the week ending 24 March 2023, their biggest drop since November last year. Analysts had instead expected a rebound of 0.092 million barrels. Gasoline stocks fell by 2.904 million barrels, above analysts’ expectations for a decline of 1.617 million barrels. Finally, distillate inventories, which include diesel and heating…
Crédito y Caución (Atradius) | After two years of decline during the pandemic years, global insolvencies increased by 9% in 2022. The increase was related to the halting of Covid fiscal support packages and the lifting of temporary changes to insolvency legislation. In some markets, insolvencies have completely normalized or even exceed pre-pandemic levels. In the majority of countries, though, we observe that insolvencies are in the process of adjusting…