Asset Allocation Update We expect LatAm equities to trail those in EM EMEA We think that MSCI’s Emerging Markets (EM) Latin America Index will continue to underperform its EM EMEA Index over the next couple of years, albeit not to the same extent as it has in 2021 so far. 12th November 2021 · 5 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Reading the runes of relative valuation within the US stock market One reason to think that the performance of the US stock market will underwhelm, at least in the long run, is that some of the gaps between the valuations of its most highly and lowly valued companies... 4th November 2021 · 3 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Correlation between US equities & Treasuries not set in stone While many observers seem to have been surprised by last month’s joint sell-off in US equities and Treasuries, there is no reason in principle why the two assets should be negatively correlated. It... 11th October 2021 · 4 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Infrastructure & reconciliation unlikely to mean Q1 rerun While the large fiscal stimulus passed in the US in the first quarter of this year appears to have been a key reason why equities there outperformed Treasuries at the time, we think that the... 6th October 2021 · 5 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Revisiting the relative valuations of US equities and bonds Although the pull-back in the S&P 500 last month was probably influenced by a sell-off in Treasuries (see here), we don’t subscribe to the view that stocks are in a big bubble that bonds are bound to... 1st October 2021 · 3 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Putting risky asset valuations into context This Update compares the valuations of the twelve different “risky” asset classes that we cover on our Asset Allocation service, both relative to one another and to the yields of “safe” assets, as... 13th September 2021 · 5 mins read
Asset Allocation Update EM assets & the risk of higher inflation We think that there is a risk of a period of moderately higher inflation in some major emerging markets (EMs) over the coming years. If that came to pass, it would probably be bad news for local... 3rd September 2021 · 4 mins read
Asset Allocation Update What the S&P 500’s valuation may mean for future returns Although the US stock market’s valuation is nearly as high now as it was at the height of dot com mania, we don’t expect the return from it to be as bad in the next decade as it was in the 2000s. 26th August 2021 · 6 mins read
Asset Allocation Update On the relative valuations of US housing and equities Despite growing talk of another bubble in the US housing market, its valuation remains far less stretched than that of the US stock market and is not alarming in our view given the prospects for... 18th August 2021 · 4 mins read
Asset Allocation The asset allocation implications of China’s slowdown The further slowdown we expect in China would probably be a headwind for some “risky” assets that are particularly sensitive to its economic cycle. It also informs our view that China’s sovereign... 4th August 2021 · 4 mins read
Asset Allocation More thoughts on the effects of inflation on asset returns The muted reaction in the markets so far to today’s above-consensus surge in US inflation presumably reflects a view that it won’t have as much of a bearing on economic growth or monetary policy as... 13th July 2021 · 6 mins read
Asset Allocation Update What’s behind renewed US equity outperformance? It has become harder to make the case that the stock market in the US will fare worse than those in the rest of the developed world, now that the “rotation” trade has fizzled out. Nonetheless, we... 7th July 2021 · 4 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Would US equities beat Treasuries if inflation surged? The received wisdom is that inflation is worse for government bonds than for equities. Yet the S&P 500 has fared worse than 10-year Treasuries in a couple of periods of high inflation in the US since... 1st July 2021 · 3 mins read
Asset Allocation Update What might a fall in oil prices mean for rotation? While the drop back in oil prices which we forecast would probably mean an end to the recent outperformance of the energy sector, we doubt it would halt several other features of the rotation trade. 30th June 2021 · 3 mins read
Asset Allocation Update REITs, equities and the threat of higher inflation We doubt that US equity REITs would significantly outperform US equities in a period of higher inflation. 24th June 2021 · 3 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Pension portfolio rebalancing not key to low UST yields Although portfolio rebalancing by US pension funds may have played a role in depressing Treasury yields, it is likely to have been a small one in the grand scheme of things. After all, they own only a... 17th June 2021 · 3 mins read
