Business Cycles
According to BCA Research’s US Bond Strategy service, the 2006/07 roadmap remains a good one for bond investors. The Fed held the funds rate steady this afternoon and made no material changes to its policy statement. That said, meeting participants did…
Over the past few months a schism has emerged in the industrial metals complex. On the one hand, the Bloomberg Industrial Metals Index – which is composed of futures contracts on copper, aluminum, zinc, nickel, and lead – has been gyrating in a trading range…
Coffee prices have surged in recent days and have now gained 8.5% over the past week. Two main forces are behind this rally. First, the recent pause in the US dollar strength is a tailwind for coffee prices. In particular, the currencies of Brazil and…
The German auto and components sector is under stress. Year-to-date, the sector’s equity prices have declined by 3.5% relative to the broader German market, and multiple indicators suggest that further challenges lie ahead. One significant concern is the…
BCA Research’s US Bond Strategy service concludes that recent BEA data are understating corporate net interest expense by a significant amount. Given the recent climb in interest rates, it would be reasonable to expect that corporate interest expense would…
Google searches for “inflation” by US users have been on a general downward trend over the past year. This is in line with developments in realized inflation as annual core CPI inflation peaked last September. Similarly, market- and survey-based measures of…
Singapore’s non-oil domestic exports (NODX) sent a pessimistic signal about the global manufacturing cycle on Monday. The 20.1% y/y contraction in August is broadly in line with July’s 20.3% y/y drop and came in below consensus estimates of a 17.1% y/y…
Monetary policy is difficult to calibrate: it is hard to get it just right. The Global Investment Strategy (GIS) service has been iterating that while the Fed could temporarily achieve a soft landing, there is much uncertainty surrounding the idea that the…
According to BCA Research’s European Investment Strategy service European inflation is likely to remain stubborn through the remainder of the decade, since the working-age population’s decline will keep the labor market tight. European rates have…
After a steady rebound in the first half of the year, the US NAHB Housing Market Index’s 5-point decline to 45 in September was a disappointment to consensus estimates of a 1-point decrease. It marks the second consecutive deterioration and brought down the…