By Philip Lawlor, managing director, head of global market research
Fear of US Fed overtightening was a major catalyst behind the global market spasms late last year. The good news is that financial conditions have broadly loosened since then, particularly in the US, bringing relief to nervous markets and powering the recent risk rally.
As we highlighted in our latest report on the global equity markets, the multi-metric FTSE Russell Financial Conditions Indicator ((FCI)) score for the US declined to 3.3 in February from a peak of 3.9 in November, while scores of other major