James Alexander via Historinhas | Brexit is an irrelevance. So say US equities. In fact, if US equities say anything, they seem to think Brexit is a good thing if it means the Fed holds off from rate rises for longer. Bring it on!
Larry Summers has written a perceptive analysis about the Fed’s confusion (and that of all the central banks, by the way) over what they are doing. Last Wednesday he made a brief reference to the FOMC’s decision not to raise rates, with the Fed once again being forced to withdraw from its previous plan of action. The total failure of ‘forward guidance,’ which has only served to make the Fed’s prose even more tedious to hide their misgivings.
James Alexander via Historinhas | The Federal Reserve and other central banks like to see themselves as “data-dependent”. They sit in objective judgement of the facts of the economy as revealed by “data” and then portentously decide whether to attempt to alter the future facts with monetary tightening or loosening.
BoAML | We have remained quite bearish on Euro area inflation for the past few years, particularly compared with ECB forecasts (but also consensus), and have highlighted the many downside risks to the inflation outlook.
Disappointing job growth in May at roughly one-third of the expected figure, coupled with a downward revision for the previous two months, cast unexpected doubts on the US recovery. The labour market has slowed to half the pace seen a year ago.
BBVA Research | The latest personal income and outlays report by the BEA, which is the favourite indicator for the Federal Reserve to measure deflation, showed that income continued to expand at a solid pace (0. 4 % MoM) , while spending increased dramatically (1 % MoM) in April . The increase in income was in line with consensus expectations, while the consumer spending increase was significantly higher (consensus expectations stood at 0.7% MoM). The increase in consumer spending in April was the highest since August 2009 .
UBS | Improved EM asset performance this year has been driven by a) the tremendous credit stimulus from China, b) a change in the reaction function of the Fed, which helped EM currencies rally against the USD, and, c) the rebalancing in the oil market. Investors are already questioning the first two, but oil has continued to trade very well.
The recent disclosure of the April FOMC minutes has come as a shock. Investors expected a cautious wait-and-see stance by the Federal Reserve at that meeting. But now we discover that a majority of its members openly supported a rate hike at the June gathering, should macro-economic delivery prove reasonably upbeat.
It feels likely that markets will be waiting for more certainty on Fed hikes to push USD higher, especially given years of post-crisis overpricing of higher interest rates.
James Alexander via Historinhas | As the FOMC increasingly avers that it is data-driven the demand to have better data has led to greater focus on aggregated current data. Whether the FOMC really looks at it, given it is ignoring its own Labour Market Conditions Index, is hard to say.