Turkey: Boom, Bust, What Comes Next?

22 February 2019 Last year's Turkish financial market crisis emanated from the confluence of several domestic and international factors. To be sure, Turkey is no stranger to boom-bust economic cycles.  And, fueled by overly expansive macroeconomic policies, the Turkish economy was overheating and inflation rising sharply by mid-2018.  Against this already challenging backdrop, the Erdogan [...]

Heading for Global Recession in 2019?

10 January 2019 Happy New Year!  I am back at work for the first time since releasing my blog in mid-December. Did I miss anything??!! In a word, it's been crazy! In September, we published our 2019 Global Strategy Outlook entitled "Turning (Even More) Defensive", in which we warned that the year ahead would be [...]

S&P 500: Tipping Point?

13 February 2018 In my 2018 Investment Strategy blog entitled "Aging Rally or More to Play For?", I indicated that while the US (and global) equity market rally was aging in calendar terms, the factors traditionally signalling the end of the cycle were not yet evident.  Nevertheless, I suggested that the US market would experience [...]

Wages and Inflation: A Mystery

Despite falling (and in some cases cyclically low) unemployment rates, wage gains are more modest now than a year ago. Central bankers are stumped by this mystery.  Whatever happened to the Philips Curve, which showed a strong relationship between unemployment and wage/price inflation? At any rate, as long as wage gains remain modest, central bankers [...]