Australia & New Zealand Economics Update RBA bond sales wouldn’t be a big headwind The Reserve Bank of Australia is considering actively selling its bond holdings rather than merely letting them shrink gradually via bond redemptions. The main motivation seems to be to reduce... 21st June 2023 · 3 mins read
UK Housing Market Focus What will be the damage from 6% mortgage rates? A return to mortgage rates of around 6% for the first time since 2007 guarantees a renewed slump in mortgage lending and a further leg down in house prices. Were mortgage rates to be sustained at that... 20th June 2023 · 15 mins read
US Housing Market Rapid Response Housing Starts (May.) Single-family starts saw the largest monthly increase in nearly three years in May, suggesting homebuilders have been responding to the recent rises in new home sales. We still expect a mild recession... 20th June 2023 · 2 mins read
US Chart Pack Hi-tech construction boom not reflected in output The investment boom in new hi-tech manufacturing plants is unprecedented, but that boom still hasn’t fed through into higher output or employment in hi-tech manufacturing and investment in IT... 20th June 2023 · 10 mins read
Global Markets Update Revising up our S&P 500 forecasts We don’t think growing enthusiasm about AI will be enough to stop the S&P 500 from declining if, as we expect, the US economy falls into recession later this year. Nonetheless, we now think the index... 20th June 2023 · 3 mins read
Australia & New Zealand Economic Outlook Aggressive tightening will weigh on activity With inflation remaining very sticky, we now expect the RBA to lift the cash rate to a peak of 4.85% by September, whereas we suspect that the RBNZ is done tightening. Extremely tight monetary policy... 20th June 2023 · 20 mins read
Canada Economics Update Housing Watch (Jun.) The recovery in house prices continued in May, with the sales-to-new listing ratio pointing to further gains ahead. Rising interest rates will have a more limited impact on home purchases than... 19th June 2023 · 4 mins read
UK Economic Outlook Stagflation nation As the UK’s recent problem of higher inflation and slower economic growth than elsewhere is largely due to the lingering effects of the pandemic and Brexit, we think the UK will probably look like the... 19th June 2023 · 20 mins read
Japan Economics Update Female participation rate hasn’t peaked yet The female participation rate has surged over the past decade but more favourable attitudes among women towards paid employment suggest that it will keep rising for a while yet. Asia Drop-In (22 nd... 19th June 2023 · 3 mins read
US Housing Market Update Recovery in sentiment will be a false dawn At face value, the recent improvement in market sentiment indicators supports the view that the worst may be past for housing. But looking deeper, we think this largely reflects supply-side... 16th June 2023 · 3 mins read
Asset Allocation Update Bubbles, recessions, & AI We now suspect growing euphoria over AI will drive the S&P 500 to a significantly higher level than we had previously forecast by the end of next year. In the meantime, though, we still think a mild... 16th June 2023 · 4 mins read
Europe Commercial Property Update Will there be a reckoning for European offices? The latest MSCI data indicate that values in western European office markets have held up better since the start of the pandemic when compared with the US and UK. But given these cities face similar... 16th June 2023 · 4 mins read
Canada Economics Weekly Full impact of higher rates still to come Heavily indebted households are still being sheltered from the full impact of the surge in interest rates over the past 18 months, but their finances look ever-more perilous. 16th June 2023 · 5 mins read
US Economics Weekly Weaker data likely to limit Fed to one more rate hike The Fed put its rate hiking cycle on pause this week but, in a hawkish shift, its new projections showed the median fed funds rate rising to 5.6% by year-end, which is consistent with 50bp of... 16th June 2023 · 5 mins read
UK Economics Weekly Growing pains in the gilt, mortgage and rental markets The surge in gilt yields above the level reached after the Truss/Kwarteng mini-budget last September has pushed mortgage rates even higher and illustrates that most of the drag on real activity and... 16th June 2023 · 10 mins read
