IG News and Press, Principal Investment Grade Corporate Active From 01/10/23

Summary On a coincident basis, driven by a historically tight labour market and robust industrial production growth, the US economy remains deceptively strong despite negative real incomes and tight financial conditions. However, the leading indicators of the business cycle continue to ...

Summary Top-down and bottom-up forecasts are increasingly diverging, and we think 2023 will be largely about how these divergences resolve themselves. In commodities, after a major spike in 2022, top-down commentators point to slowing growth and inflation, and the historical pattern of ...

Summary Recession foretold in developed markets (DM), a pause in central bank rate hikes and China’s reopening help shape 2023 and reinforce our tactical views. European equities led DM stocks higher. Surprisingly weak U.S. services data spurred bets for Federal Reserve rate cuts...

Summary The stock market needs to fall around 20% to be at parity with lower-rated investment-grade bonds. The US corporate bond market is still more attractive than the US stock market. Be ready for the stock market to fall further after the Fed stops tightening, when the recession...

Summary As central banks battled inflation, interest rates soared and recession fears mounted. Now, central banks must slow their pace of tightening and carefully calibrate a soft landing. We address the challenges of a global slowdown, the benefits of higher yields and strategies f...

Summary A historic 2022 taught us to widen the lens of possible scenarios, factor in geopolitical risk and use a new playbook for more frequent portfolio changes. Global stocks ended the year down 18%, while bonds fell 16%. This marked the biggest market storm in decades amid inflation ...

Summary The Fed’s interest rate and liquidity tools are blunt instruments, particularly in a service-oriented economy. If inflation indeed moderates from here, it is likely that interest rate volatility moderates alongside it. Monetary policy has created the asset-on/asset-of...

Summary An all-time low in interest rates was reached when the Fed cut the fed funds rate to approximately zero in late 2008 in an effort to pull the economy out of the GFC. The Fed deemed the inflation “transitory,” it continued its policies of low-interest rates and quan...

Summary 1 or more years of additional interest-rate duration in ‘23 vs. ‘22, to be grown over time: As central banks slow, or pause, their tightening cycles, in sympathy with slowing economic growth and inflation. 6% to 6.5% of portfolio carry potential (including anticipa...

Summary As we enter 2023, bottom-up fundamental research is going to be critical as we go through this environment. So economic growth in '23 is pretty uncertain in some regions, maybe a little bit more certain in others. I think energy transition is something which is going to cont...