CoreMacro

China's economic recovery will be led by consumer spending on services rather than the industrial sector. The current equity market leadership – outperformance by tech stocks – is unsustainable. Persistent deflationary forces will compel policymakers to inject more liquidity and bring down interest rates to reflate the economy. Hence, the RMB will resume its decline against the USD soon.

The only feasible way for Brazil to stabilize its public debt-to-GDP ratio is by having nominal GDP growth meaningfully above government borrowing costs. This requires large fiscal stimulus to boost nominal GDP and much lower interest rates. These factors will constitute the economic policy anchor of Lula’s 3.0 presidency. When markets begin to price this in, the outcome will be chronic downward pressure on the currency.

Vietnamese stocks can remain shaky for a few more months. But they have cheapened considerably, and equity portfolios with longer terms investment horizon should overweight them in EM, Emerging Asia and Frontier Market portfolios.

Investors were heartened by the November CPI report, but the Fed said not so fast. Although it snuffed out the latest mini-rally, ongoing disinflation will set the stage for another one early next year.

Special Report

Both the US and China have structural imbalances that need correcting. The former has a structurally imbalanced labour market in which demand far outstrips supply. The latter has a massively overvalued housing market. The concurrent correction of these two structural imbalances in the world’s two largest economies will necessitate a sharp slowdown in global growth, and leads to several investment conclusions.

Special Report

How to play the reopening? Which sectors will benefit the most? What will be the impact of the reopening on the rest of the world? Why is the PBoC facing the Impossible Trinity? Why has the PBoC tightened liquidity, prompting a rise in onshore interest rates? What are the implications for interest rates and the currency going forward? Is it time to upgrade Chinese onshore and offshore stocks?

Special Report

Our recommendations for podcasts (on macro and markets, as well as non-work-related topics) to try over the holidays.

Special Report

Following the release of the Bank Credit Analyst’s annual outlook, we unveil our key views for 2023. The investment strategy takeaway is that we want to lean into risk in the early part of the year but reduce exposure to it in the second half.

Special Report

We explore the eight major themes that will define economic and market trends for Europe next year.

In this Strategy Outlook, we present the major investment themes and views we see playing out next year and beyond.