My wife is an archaeologist. When in social gatherings her job has always garnered more interest than mine, which in noisier atmospheres is often heard as fun manager.
One question that I get asked a lot at the moment is that if I expect recessions in many of the leading economies, why am I positive on credit?
2022 was a traumatic year for financial markets – but this is something we are getting used to. Fixed income markets were the main casualty with both government and credit bonds taking a battering.
Is the UK heading for a housing crash? Last week saw the Halifax house price index decline by 2.3% in November, confirming the fall reported earlier by Nationwide.
Last week was all about interest rate decisions. Strangely, although the Federal Reserve (Fed), Bank of England (BoE) and European Central Bank (ECB) all increased rates by 50bps there was quite a bit of divergence underneath.
Sometimes markets see what they want to see. The interpretation of the latest statements from the Chairman of the Federal Reserve (Fed) was a case in point.
Michael Dobbs, author of House of Cards, would have been hard pressed to come up with the story lines that have played out in the UK in the last few months.
The Blame Game has started. Who should be held responsible for the shambles of last week? Let’s look at the suspects.
After a big build up, the week came to something of a disappointing end for some. While it was a fantastic event, Roger Federer’s last professional career match ended in defeat for him.
While relatively very few of us will have known or have met her, Queen Elizabeth’s passing and the dawning of the Carolean era is momentous.
There was a big rise in UK government bond yields last week, reflecting the inflation data which came in above expectations.
“It never rains but it pours”. A strange saying and metrologically inappropriate at this time. But the gist is that misfortunes come at the same time. The recent heatwave in Europe is a good example.
The Bank of England (BoE) hiked UK bank rate to 1.75% last week, meeting expectations of a 50bps move. The immediate reaction in the market was to take bond yields lower. Why was this?
It may seem like a strange question, but why should fund managers continue to pay attention to third-party investment strategists whose views have not worked out as expected?
I have committed to writing a maximum of 1,000 words in my weekly journal. It should take 5-7 minutes to read – so, by the time you finish reading this, the UK will have incurred about £1.5m in additional debt, equivalent to over £5,000 a second.
A colleague asked me how I would score Boris Johnson. In one sense that’s a pretty open goal: no coherent political philosophy, chaotic management, a trust deficit, record high taxes, inflation at a 40-year high and mountains of debt. However, history may be kinder, especially if Boris writes it.
It was the week of interest rate moves. But with a twist: the US Federal Reserve (Fed) went hard with a 75bps hike, while the Bank of England (BoE) increased rates from 1% to 1.25%.
James Carville, an advisor to President Clinton, was once quoted as saying: “I used to think if there was reincarnation, I wanted to come back as the President or the Pope or a 0.400 baseball hitter. But now I want to come back as the bond market. You can intimidate anybody.”
The BBC really does not get finance and business reporting. Listening to the business slot on Radio 4 last Wednesday morning, it was apparent that they had missed the big news of the previous day.
It was an interesting week for responsible investment. Stuart Kirk put the cat among the pigeons by suggesting that there were more important issues for investors to consider than climate change.