With the consumer price index in the US hitting a four-decade high in December 2021, rising 7% year-on-year, the investment conversation in 2022 will be dominated by persistent inflation and its impact on financial markets. With a collision between pandemic-related supply chain bottlenecks, labour shortages and growing demand, the US Fed is no longer talking…
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As we enter a new year, it is an opportune time to reflect on the performance of the markets in 2021 and cast our eyes to the future. Looking back to the start of the previous year, we expected equity markets to deliver moderate returns; cautioned that many geopolitical risks were still in play; and…
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Early last year, we published a news edition entitled “The year of the vaccine”. Our thesis was that the success (or not) of the vaccine rollouts would determine the timing and extent to which global economies would reopen and normalise. This would, in turn, have a profound impact on the sustainability of the equity market…
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Last week’s introduction to our news flash concluded that “the Omicron variant does not warrant a change in our view that the global economy is on a road – albeit bumpy – to a full recovery”. As coronaviruses constantly mutate, they tend to lose their pathogenic intensity. Omicron seems to be following this path. Those…
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Our header may appear presumptuous, but this week the Omicron fear factor that gripped financial markets last Thursday and Friday, appeared to have reversed as we initially witnessed rebounds in both equities and currencies, with subsequent market directionality driven primarily by a focus on the US Fed’s updated outlook. Last week’s global market declines, which…
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