In my Strategy 2024 blog entitled "Powell Pivot: What Could Go Wrong or Right?", I suggested global financial markets had entered a cyclical sweet spot. Specifically, the combination of steady (if uneven) global growth, declining inflation, and easing monetary conditions pointed to higher equity market valuations. Indeed, even my bullish S&P 500 projection of 5,800 [...]
Tag: USA
Election 2024 Edition #2: International Trade
30 September 2024 In an earlier article "Election 2024: What They're Not Telling Us #1", I suggested the two Presidential candidates were engaged in a "conspiracy of silence" regarding key policy issues. Last time, I indicated American fiscal policy is on an unsustainable course, but both party leaders have evaded the topic, let alone suggested [...]
Global Government Debt: Balloon Still Expanding
Government efforts to mitigate the economic consequences of the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) and the Covid pandemic have led to surging government debt. In the United States, for instance, public sector liabilities are approaching levels not seen before in peacetime (Chart above). And, while I will discuss important differences between countries and regions, the United [...]
Soft Landing: What Could Go Wrong?
5 February 2023 After a bruising 2022, global financial markets now have fully embraced the propect of a "soft landing" for the global economy. Even the IMF has revised up its 2023 GDP growth forecast following China's post-Covid opening, declining European natural gas prices, and signs that world-wide inflation may have peaked. In the United [...]