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Recession-Hard/Soft Landing

Copper rallied to a two-month high by the end of last week. Importantly, this move did not occur in isolation. It coincides with greater optimism about the prospects of a soft landing. Indeed, the US economic surprise index is solidly in positive territory…

Stocks fare best when there is plenty of slack in the economy and growth is strong and getting stronger. The good news is that the economic growth score for the US in our MacroQuant model is above its historic average. The bad news is that US economy is operating with little slack and sentiment is getting complacent. We recommend that investors maintain a modest overweight to equities for the time being but look to get more defensive later this year or in early 2024.

The Fed’s latest Beige Book reveals that economic activity rose slightly in recent weeks. The results are based on surveys and interviews conducted across 12 districts through June 30. In particular, two of the districts experienced “slight and modest…

Falling inflation enables central banks to pause rate hikes, which is good news. But time goes on. Restrictive monetary policy, Chinese debt-deflation, energy supply shocks, US and global policy uncertainty, and extreme geopolitical risks will undermine hopes of a soft landing and beautiful disinflation.

The June US CPI release showed inflationary pressures cooled last month. The headline index moderated from 4.0% y/y to 3.0% y/y – slightly below expectations of 3.1% y/y. Similarly, core CPI growth eased from 5.3% y/y to 4.8% y/y – a sharper slowdown than the…
As expected, the Bank of Canada raised interest rates for the second consecutive month after restarting its tightening campaign last month. At 5.0%, the policy rate now stands 4.75 percentage points above where it was at the start of the tightening cycle last…
Wheat, corn, and soybean all traded lower at the Chicago Board of Trade on Wednesday following the US Department of Agriculture’s latest release of its monthly World Agricultural Supply and Demand Estimates (WASDE) – down 4.2%, 3.5%, and 2.4%, respectively. …
Hot UK wage data focused investors’ attention on the Bank of England’s battle against sticky inflationary pressures on Tuesday. The 7.3% y/y increase in weekly earnings (excluding bonuses) in the three months to May surpassed expectations of a 7.1% y/y rise…
The NFIB survey provided a slightly positive signal about the US economy in June. Small business optimism improved from 89.4 to a 7-month high of 91.0 – beating expectations of a more muted increase to 89.9. Details of the report corroborate the signal…
The latest update of the Manheim Used Vehicle Price Index provides a positive signal for US goods inflation. It shows used car prices fell by -4.2% m/m (-10.1% y/y) in June – its third consecutive monthly decline following a brief pickup in…