EWJE News and Press, iShares MSCI Japan Equal Weighted ETF From 09/03/21

The August nonfarm payroll report showed the delta variant hit to the economy is just beginning. Next week is all about Fed speak. ECB meetings are about to get far more interesting. It is a quiet week for economic data, with Wednesday’s JOLTS job openings reading for July,...

Global manufacturing remained beset by unprecedented supply issues in July, which constrained output and drove prices higher. The analysis of survey responses suggests that the number of companies reporting lower production due to staff or materials shortages is running at around five...

The issue of demography plagues Japan and the U.S. equally. The advancing decades show birth rates dropping as dependency on social welfare climbs. The problem, as with Japan, is that demographics are undermining the support for the social welfare system. The aging population is curre...

Equities wobbled a bit midway through August, but they have since regained their mojo, all but confirming that the bull market in equities remains strong and unchallenged. A reduction in the pace of QE is coming, in both the US and Europe. Indeed, the pace of asset purchases already h...

Now that Jackson Hole is over, the focus shifts back onto the economic recovery. The euro area economy is ticking along nicely. Data from the UK this week showed that, despite all restrictions being lifted, the economy continues to face headwinds because of supply and labour short...

Global real GDP reached a new high in the second quarter of 2021, completing a year-long recovery from the COVID-19 recession. The resilience of the global economy amid a lingering pandemic suggests that the world is learning to live with the COVID-19 virus. Western Europe's consu...

We’ve recently updated our Asia game theater, and although these changes partly reflect the recent regulatory crackdown in China, our update was independent of recent Chinese equity market volatility. Incentives appear to be aligning for increasing rhetoric between the United S...

The upcoming week is all about the Federal Reserve’s symposium in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Government regulatory risk continues to dominate China equity markets, this time with President Xi pushing an agenda of wealth redistribution from rich to poor. Global macro weakness ha...

The volatility of the dollar does present some problems for the world but, for better or worse, it is the world’s reserve currency and I see no real threat to that status on the horizon. I positioned our portfolios for a weak dollar period early last summer and maintained those...

Global equity markets have diverged widely lately, with European and US stocks strongly outperforming the rest of the world. Despite recent strength, Europe has performed roughly in line with its global peers since last year. Contributions to the FTSE All-World ex USA returns were...