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Business Cycles

Reported earnings for Q4-2023 were rather underwhelming and prone to issues that we have identified over the past few months: Growth is concentrated in just a few sectors and companies, while the profitability of a broad swath of the equity market is under pressure from disinflation and sticky wages. Consumers are still spending, but less enthusiastically than before, while a switch from spending on services to spending on goods is in its very early innings. Downgrade Consumer Staples to neutral.

The Global Manufacturing PMI clocked in at 50 in January – exactly on the boom-bust line. The index has been on a general uptrend since mid-2023 with the January figure marking the first non-contractionary reading since August 2022. The headline index…
According to BCA Research’s Global Investment Strategy service, although the next recession is likely to be mild-to-moderate, the ensuing financial avalanche will be more severe. Valuations are highly stretched and hopes that today’s tech leaders will…
The US retail sales report for January delivered a disappointing message about consumer spending. The 0.8% m/m drop in overall retail sales was worse than expectations of a 0.2% m/m decline and marked the most severe monthly contraction since last March. The…
The first two regional fed manufacturing surveys for February delivered strong upside surprises. The New York Fed’s Empire Index surged from -43.7 to -2.4, unwinding its January slump. Similarly, the Philly Fed current activity index jumped by 15.8 points to…
According to BCA Research’s Emerging Markets Strategy service, the diminishing pace of disinflation in the US could pose a threat to US share prices in the near term. In the medium term, the key risk to US share prices is shrinking corporate profits.  …

Over the next six months, the deterioration in non-US growth will occur earlier and be more pronounced than in the US. This expectation reinforces our confidence to bet on the strength of the US dollar. As usual, the flip side of the US dollar strength will be weakness in EM risk assets.

Prices of agricultural commodities have come under intensified downward pressure this year. Corn, soybean, and wheat prices have fallen by 8.6%, 8.3%, and 4.9% respectively so far this year. Multiple factors are behind the selloff. First, ag prices…
We are now more than midway through the Q4 2023 earnings season. Roughly two-thirds of the companies in the S&P 500 have released their earnings reports. It’s therefore worthwhile to stand back and observe some of the trends. According to FactSet, 75%…
The UK inflation release for January came in slightly softer than anticipated. Both headline and core CPI were unchanged on year-over-year basis at 4.0% and 5.1%, respectively – below expectations of slight accelerations. The 0.6% m/m decline in the headline…