Despite a recent modest pullback in U.S. stocks, and a sharper one in international markets—reflecting both trade worries and the recent strength in the U.S. dollar—we don’t believe it marks the beginning of a more severe correction. Risks of a prolonged trade dispute have risen but it’s too soon to declare war; while the possibility of a positive resolution that would likely be a tailwind for equities. For now, a healthy U.S. economy is an offset to those growing worries. Threats to the current bull market have risen, and they include this being a midterm election year—which have historically been accompanied by larger-than-average maximum drawdowns. We continue to espouse discipline and diversification; but for now it’s in the context of an ongoing bull market.
We’re a little more than a week into the 2018 FIFA World Cup, and so far Russia has surprised experts and fans alike. Expectations were low at best. Because of recent setbacks, including a disastrous performance at the 2016 UEFA European Championship and injuries sustained by key players, the federation ranked a dismal 66th place among Fédération Internationale de Football Association teams—its lowest position ever. The only reason it didn’t have to qualify to compete was because Russia is the host nation. (This is the first time in its 88-year history, by the way, that the World Cup has been held in Eastern Europe.)
This business expansion has gone on for nine years and most investors think we have to be near the end. In baseball parlance you hear talk that we are in the seventh or eighth inning; nobody seems to believe we are in the second or third. Jamie Dimon of J.P. Morgan has said at a conference we’re in the sixth, which got a lot of attention.
"A rising global interest rate environment is once again leading to volatility in the emerging debt markets,” writes GMO’s Carl Ross in a newly-published Emerging Debt Insights piece. As the US 10-year Treasury has risen to the 3% neighborhood, benchmarks of emerging country bonds, both in hard currency and local currency, have fallen.
We've always been skeptical that bond yields carry deep meaning about the future. Low Treasury bond yields in recent years were said to be a signal of slower growth, or possibly a recession, ahead. And the bond world said stocks were over-valued.
We have used this quip from the book Why You Win or Lose: The Psychology of Speculation by Fred C. Kelly many times in our missives over the past nearly five decades because the wisdom of its message is timeless. We recalled it last week in many of our meetings in New York City when we heard certain individual investors, as well as portfolio managers (PMs), say “I should have!”
Recent posts from the diversified fixed income team have discussed how bond investors should be prepared to navigate a market that may look very different from what they've grown used to. In other words, it might be time to reassess the old bond-investing playbook.
The U.S. inflation story made further inroads this month, with year-over-year price growth for consumers and producers alike hitting multiyear highs. U.S. consumer prices expanded at their strongest pace in more than six years, climbing to an annual change of 2.8 percent in May. Prices for final demand goods, meanwhile, grew 3.1 percent, their strongest annual surge since December 2011.
The European Central Bank’s June meeting has offered some long-hoped-for clarity on the future direction of monetary policy in the eurozone. However, it hasn’t provided all the answers, and much remains open to interpretation. David Zahn, Franklin Templeton’s head of European Fixed Income, considers what might happen next and explains why he’s still not expecting a eurozone interest-rate hike before 2020.
Investors and their advisors must be alert to managing both pre-tax and after-tax alpha in order for investors to realize the highest possible return from their taxable portfolios. Increasingly, the opportunities to accomplish both goals are within reach of investors through, for example, tax-advantaged smart beta strategies and tax-efficient vehicles such as ETFs.
Every quarter we ask bond and currency managers to consider valuations, expectations and outlooks for the coming months. Today, we’ve put the spotlight on U.S. rates and inflation expectations, credit markets and casualties from rising U.S. interest rates.
Venezuela has experienced a collapse in oil production this year as the country sinks into chaos. Daily production is down from 1.7M barrels/day at the end of last year to just 1.44M barrels/day at the end of May. Year-over-year production declines are even larger, down about 500k barrels/day.
While the recent backup in 10-year Treasury yields may look stark on short-term charts (namely 1-year and 2-year charts), the move we’ve seen in rates thus far is actually very normal considering where we are in the economic cycle.
The federal deficit and the cost to service that debt are rising at the same time. This historical anomaly is putting the U.S. on a “suicide mission,” according to Jeffrey Gundlach.
At a time of low expected returns, low current yields and economic uncertainty, individual investors are demanding new options. Recent advances in product design enable investors to access less liquid and illiquid institutional-caliber alternatives in a “user-friendly” format which preserves the integrity of the underlying strategy. These new product designs contrast mutual funds which may contain watered-down liquid versions of the original.
New thinking about liquidity, its role in a portfolio and improved access to a wide spectrum of alternatives enables investors to deploy less liquid strategies and capitalize on liquidity premiums.
One of the potential rude awakenings that we advised investors to prepare for in our recent Secular Outlook is a surprising surge of productivity growth over the next several years.
This week financial market participants were delivered a cogent explanation for the weakness in EM stocks, bonds and currencies by India’s central bank governor, Mr. Urjit Patel.
Bob Browne is an executive vice president and chief investment officer for Northern Trust. He is a member of Northern Trust's operating group and management group. He is also co-portfolio manager of the Northern Global Tactical Asset Allocation Fund (BBALX), a top-performing, multi-asset fund.
Volatility in yields got you down? Fearful of more rising rates ahead? Worried your bond portfolio will sink into the red? We have strategies that will help keep you dry, even if the waves get high.
You might think institutions with their large staffs of highly-paid and experienced investment professionals would be a force for stability and reason in financial markets. They are not; stocks heavily owned, and constantly monitored by institutions, have often been among the most inappropriately valued.
US interest rates have defied market expectations in recent years, staying historically low despite solid economic growth. But in the last year, and especially the last few months, rates have started to climb.
U.S. stocks have moved toward the top of the recent range but volatility is likely to rise at times during the summer as investors deal with various global geopolitical headwinds. Further strength in the U.S. dollar would likely exacerbate the volatility—particularly within emerging markets. But limited signs of pending recession risk—at least in the United States—should keep the path of least resistance for the stock market higher. That said, patience and discipline are more important than ever in the face of sometimes ominous-sounding headlines.
The team illustrates the economic background behind the Korean summit meeting and profiles corporate debt.
If you live in Texas and have any extra gold bars, coins and/or jewelry lying around that need safekeeping, you’re in luck. The Texas Bullion Depository, the first of its kind in the U.S., officially opened to the public in Austin this week, putting a cap on three years of planning and construction. The private firm managing the facility, Lone Star Tangible Assets, calls it the “world’s most advanced depository.”
Italy may have a government, but the country's problems haven't gone away. That's a worry for the euro zone.
Despite long-running international concerns about China’s property “bubble,” the market has proven quite resilient. The Chinese government has instituted various austerity measures to cool the market, but buoyant demand for property has helped avoid any serious downturn.
The Great Bond Bull Market is Over June 2016 will most likely be remembered as the end of the great bond bull market. 34 years earlier in 1982, when then Fed Chair Paul Volcker turned the full force of the Federal Reserve to fighting inflation, both the 10 year Treasury yield and the Consumer Price Index (CPI) stood at approximately 15%.
While factor-based, style investing in equities has become popular, its adoption has been much slower in other asset classes, including fixed income. New research shows that style investing can also be applied to bonds.
The Federal Reserve has two primary mandates: maximizing employment and stable prices. Congress also included moderating long-term interest rates as part of the Fed’s overall objective, but that should be the offshoot of stable prices. In May the unemployment rate fell to 3.8% which is the lowest since April 2000.
Bond investors are worried about rising rates in today’s environment. Many are protecting themselves by moving to cash or other very short investments. But is their “safe” choice putting them at risk?
The U.S. economy has been growing for nine straight years—but current macroeconomic indicators hint that the good times may be coming to an end as soon as next year.
Russ explains why gold is not working as an effective equity hedge, despite higher volatility.
Strong growth and employment reports affirm Northern Trust’s positive outlook for U.S. economic performance in the rest of 2018.
A segment of the credit market many investors may overlook, preferred securities are one of PIMCO’s highest-conviction credit views today.
I can’t quite remember how I met Craig Drill, captain of Drill Capital Management, but meet him I did over a decade ago and we have become kindred spirts. Maybe it’s because we both have been in the business a long time, or maybe it is because of our connection to First Boston in a life gone by.
Things just got interesting – maybe. It is hard to write anything definitive given how quickly events are unfolding. Investors were taking turns being spooked by possible trade wars, cancelled (but now rescheduled) Korean denuclearization summits, and elevating unrest in the Middle East. The US market continues its volatile tug-of-war between heavy fiscal stimulus and tightening monetary policy.
The hallmark of an economic Ponzi scheme is that the operation of the economy relies on the constant creation of low-grade debt in order to finance consumption and income shortfalls among some members of the economy, using the massive surpluses earned by other members of the economy. The factors most responsible for today’s lopsided prosperity are exactly the seeds from which the next crisis will spring.
The macro data from the past month continues to mostly point to positive growth. On balance, the evidence suggests the imminent onset of a recession is unlikely.
Prices will rise—for producers and consumers alike—which is good for gold but a headwind for continued economic growth.
Over the next decade, we will endure increasingly damaging debt crises that culminate in a coordinated global default—“The Great Reset,” as I call it. There are limits in how much leverage the world can handle, and I think we are already beyond them. And that is before we have a global recession. The only question now is how we will manage the collapse.
Serious gold investors know that May has historically been a weak month for the price of the yellow metal. For the 10-year and 30-year periods, the month delivered negative returns.
Italy’s proposed coalition collapsed over the weekend after the president refused to accept euroskeptic Paolo Savona as Minister of Finance. Markets have since reacted, with Italian government bond yields rising above their eurozone counterparts. Unsurprisingly, with the possibility of another election in the cards, market sentiment has shifted to risk-off in light of the political uncertainty.
We expect a more difficult market environment will surprise many investors as the post-crisis era ends. It’s time to position for the opportunities ahead.
Emerging market (EM) stock indices have generally trailed the S&P 500 Index in the years after the financial crisis, although developing markets handily outpaced the U.S. in 2017.
Readers of these missives should know our fundamental energy analysts have been bullish on oil for quite some time, as have we. In fact, we have been bullish on commodities in general, often noting they are the cheapest relative to equities as they have been since the 1960s. Yet last week crude oil’s decline spooked energy investors, raising the question, “Is the crude oil rally over?”
For income investors, rising interest rates have created both a challenging market environment and a better outlook for yield.
High-yield investors bracing for a downturn in 2018 can relax. By some metrics, high-yield companies have rarely looked better. The way we see it, investors who do their homework can still profit in this environment.
The first defaults will occur at the lowest end of the problematic market: high yield or “junk” bonds. They will play a role comparable to subprime mortgages in the last crisis. We’ll see mortgage problems as well, but I think overleveraged companies will be the core problem.
This shouldn’t surprise anyone, but public trust in the federal government is eroding. Sixty years ago, 75 percent of Americans expressed faith in the government to do the right thing “most of the time” or “just about always.” Seventy-five percent! You can’t get 75 percent of people to agree on anything now, as the recent “Laurel or Yanny” video proved.
We believe the news is evidence of a broader shift toward simpler corporate structures in the midstream energy sector – a trend that supports our investment approach and our constructive view of the sector.
