Videos

As if a tight labor market, rising inflation and widespread fuel shortages weren’t enough to contend with, the United Kingdom is also seeing a sharp deterioration in its relations with the European Union, and France especially. Nick examines what worsening cross-Channel relations could mean for the economies of the UK and EU.

A material difference has opened up in both the actions and signaling of global central banks, as they exit from pandemic-era monetary policy settings. On the hawkish side is the likes of the Federal Reserve and on the dovish side the European Central Bank and a raft of Asian policymakers. The question is who could be on the verge of making a policy mistake.

Asian economies are often lumped into the collective bucket of following “zero-Covid” elimination strategies. That has certainly been the case in most of the region’s big economies. However, there is increasingly an impetus by the better-vaccinated countries to fully reopen. Vincent surveys the landscape and draws some conclusions regarding preferred currency plays.

As investors have flipped between euphoria and dejection over the future of crypto-currencies and related digital assets, prices have had a crazy ride. In this video Will outlines a framework for thinking about valuations. Even if digital art sold as NFTs sticks around, the basic economics of their use case means they probably won't be great stores of value.

Ahead of Germany’s election in a couple of weeks, the center-left Social Democratic Party has recently climbed up the polls to eclipse the previously dominant Christian Democratic Union. If the polling is right, the SPD is likely to form a coalition government with Germany’s smaller parties. Nick breaks out the tea leaves to see what a political shift is likely to mean.

In the same week that the US military completed its chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, President Joe Biden outlined a more contained doctrine for US foreign policy. In this video interview, Yanmei argues against a declinist view of the Kabul dash for the exit, contending that the longer-term impact may be a much-needed reset of the American imperial project.

India has been a tough place for multinationals to make big capital investments. Just this week the country’s highest court cleared the way for anti-trust action against Amazon and Walmart’s online retail platforms. However, a counter-trend move has been the government backing away from a retrospective tax that has been deployed against foreign investors.

Since the depths of the pandemic, the US labor market has recovered remarkably quickly. A key question for investors is how long strong job creation can be sustained before upward wage pressure returns. Ahead of Fridays’ payrolls report, Kai Xian outlines the key drivers of the US labor market.

Apple's Tim Cook warned investors that it would face microchip shortages in the second half of the year. Yet last week, Taiwan Manufacturing Semiconductor said that it saw an abatement of the great chip shortage. In this video interview, Vincent seeks to reconcile these two statements, and explain what it all means for Asian exports.

After a two-year suspension, the US debt ceiling will soon be reimposed at current levels. Official estimates suggest that the Treasury can delay defaulting on its debt for three to four months. That is shorter than the five months the Treasury was able to delay during a similar standoff over the debt ceiling in 2019. Ultimately, Congress should act and default will be avoided.

Having gone into lockdown first, China was also the first economy to emerge, and has since enjoyed a rapid rebound in industrial production and exports, reflected in financial markets. But now that the economy is back to “normal”, policymakers have returned to a conservative stance which focuses on financial stability.

Charles Gave, Louis-Vincent Gave, Didier Darcet and Cedric Gemehl delved into the results of the US election, and discussed the latest impact of Covid-19 on the global economy and markets. Additionally, they presented Gavekal’s latest research on portfolio construction.

With the US election outcome likely subject to a period of litigation and some uncertainty, yesterday Gavekal partners and US analysts convened to discuss the possible scenarios lying ahead and what they're likely to mean for asset markets.

The world is focused on the US election, with concerns over a disputed result. Our US team of analysts are less worried about process than the substantive impact of big changes in domestic economic policy settings. Will, Yanmei and KX assessed the likely fallout from November 3 and assess the latest US economic data with a focus on threats to the US recovery should the pandemic worsen and near-term fiscal responses remain uncertain.

China’s financial technology industry has been chaotic for two decades, with Ant Group launching pioneering new products while regulators and competitors play catch-up. With Ant Group ready for its IPO, the push-and-pull between the firm and regulators is grabbing institutional investors’ attention. Matthew Forney and Laila Khawaja of Gavekal Fathom China addressed this tension and also the broader impact of regulation on the country's fintech industry.

Emerging markets have had very different pandemic experiences and the effects are showing up in economic data and market performance. Northeast Asian economies offer strong growth opportunities while southeast Asia is muddling through in a way that favors bond investors. The good news in Asia is that struggling economies such as India and Indonesia are pursuing reform initiatives. The picture is less rosy in Latin America, while Turkey offers the potential for a macro shock to emerge.

The advance of the private sector and the retreat of the state sector has been central to China’s long transformation from an isolated socialist nation to a globally connected economy. Yet the notions of China’s private sector being either in the ascendency, or facing a squeeze in the statist Xi Jinping era are not born out by the facts. Andrew Batson discussed the findings in his recent major piece of research on this topic.

Yanmei Xie discussed the US team’s assessment of risks surrounding the US election, Anatole Kaletsky explained the reasons for his return to bullishness and Louis Gave talked about global asset allocation and how to find “anti-fragile” assets.

Yesterday Cedric Gemehl, Nick Andrews and Anatole Kaletsky joined Tom Holland to discuss what's going on in Europe. Topics ranged from how the economy is fairing in the second wave of the outbreak, what that means for asset prices, and also where Brexit fits into all this.

In yesterday’s webinar, Andrew Batson presented an overview of where the Chinese economy is going and how the relationship with the US is evolving, and Dan Wang addressed recent US actions in the technological rivalry between the two countries, particularly the latest executive orders on WeChat and TikTok.