Why? Trade Hopes dashed – It turned out a deal with China wasn’t quite yet a done deal. Politicians should be reminded that markets move much faster than trade negotiations or Congress. Yield Curve approaching inversion – Five-year drops below two-year, but maybe we should wait for the ten year to drop too. Rising Interest Read more […]
The South African economy, Africa’s second-largest economy after Nigeria, may be helped by reforms put in place by President Cyril Ramaphosa. Earlier this year, South Africa suffered a setback, as data showed the economy dipping into a recession, but Ramophosa has since unveiled a stimulus and recovery plan to try and get it back on Read more […]
In a prior blog,[1] we highlighted the return profile and yield of the S&P/LSTA U.S. Leveraged Loan 100 Index. We showed that carry is the dominant driver of returns. In this follow-up post, we review additional characteristics of the senior loan market and its evolution in recent years. The leveraged loan deal size has increased Read more […]
On Monday, Oct. 29, 2018, Andrés Manuel López Obrador, president-elect of Mexico, announced that he would cancel the construction of the new airport in Mexico City, which had reached 30% completion. After a four-day unofficial referendum, in which less than 2% of the voters participated, the upcoming president (who will assume office on Dec. 1, Read more […]
Since the end of 2015, the U.S. Federal Reserve has raised the policy rate eight times to currently 2.0%-2.25%. The minutes of the recent September FOMC meeting reiterated the committee’s positive growth outlook and confidence on 2% inflation. Market players continued to catch up on pricing future Fed hikes. Currently the market is implying approximately Read more […]
Real U.S. interest rates have shifted upward YTD in 2018, with a larger shift on the short end than the long̬̬—producing a flatter curve. Exhibit 1 shows the real yield curve (from 5 to 30 years) at the end of each quarter since December 2017 and also includes data as of Oct. 9, 2018 to Read more […]
Maybe you can’t technically get fired after retiring, but running out of income in retirement is a real risk many people fear. According to TIAA, 49% of Americans say their No. 1 goal for a retirement plan is to provide guaranteed monthly income in retirement, and 68% of Americans would first choose a retirement paycheck that Read more […]
Sales of new and existing single-family homes have fallen since their recent high in November 2017 while pending home sales are flat to down so far this year. Starts of new single-family homes are volatile but also remain below the peak seen at the end of 2017. Recent press reports of declining activity in several Read more […]
Last week, the SPIVA Latin America Mid-Year 2018 Scorecard was released. The scorecard tracks the performance of active mutual funds in Brazil, Chile, and Mexico through the end of June 2018. Exhibit 1 shows how managers fared against their respective category benchmarks for one-, three-, and five-year lookback periods. In the short- and long-term periods, Read more […]
With this morning’s S&P Corelogic Case-Shiller Home Price Indices report that house prices continue to rise even as existing home sales flatten out, analysts are debating if the hoped-for recovery from Hurricane Florence could reignite home sales or simply mean upward price pressure on housing and construction. Current damage estimates for Florence are close to Read more […]
