(Washington)
Goldman Sachs thinks the Dollar might be in a for big surprise. On top of his grumbling about the Fed not lowering rates quickly enough, President Trump has been tweeting about the unfair advantage that other countries have in lowering their value against the Dollar. Trump apparently wants a weak Dollar to help the US compete more effectively in the global economy. Accordingly, Goldman Sachs think there is a good chance that Trump uses some special tool to intervene and weaken the currency, such as through the Treasury department.
FINSUM: This is not as unprecedented as it sounds. Even Powell has said the Treasury is the traditional power in charge of exchange rate policy. This would likely have a big impact on markets.
(Washington)
Jerome Powell’s performance could not have been much better. He gave exactly what the people wanted—dovishness. In fact, if anything, he was almost comically dovish, disregarding the very strong jobs performance last month. No matter though, investors are pleased as it now looks nearly 100% likely the Fed will cut rates later this month, and seems as though they will stay on a cutting path for some time. The Fed’s shift in policy appears to affirm that they are currently considering the condition of the global economy as a major threat to the US.
FINSUM: The Fed is in a pretty easy spot if you think about it. Inflation is very low, markets want cuts, and the global economy is looking weak. Simple solution with no real downside—cut rates.
(New York)
Investors likely already know that low cost index funds tend to greatly outperform high fee actively managed funds (to the tune of 1.5% or more annually). That comes as no surprise. However, what was surprising to us is that in fixed income, the tables are greatly turned. While passive funds do have a slight edge over active ones on average (0.18% per year), in many cases high fee actively managed fixed income funds outperform passive ones. This holds true over long time periods, including ten-year horizons.
FINSUM: This is an interesting finding and one that makes intuitive sense. The bond market is vast, hard to access, and full of intricacies. That kind of environment lends itself to specialism in a way that large cap equities does not, and the performance metrics show it.
(New York)
The yield curve inversion has largely faded from headlines. Things that become the status quo often do! But in that development lays a hidden but worrying truth—the longer the yield curve is inverted, the more likely it is that there will be a recession. The inversion has been in place for over a month now and it is actually getting worse, with long-term yields continuing to drop. A yield curve inversion has proceeded every US recession in the last 50 years.
FINSUM: If the Fed proceeds with cuts, it seems like the inversion may abate. But then again, the rate cut would be an implicit admission that we are on the way to a recession.
(Washington)
It is no secret that Trump is a critic of the current Federal Reserve. He has frequently complained about Powell and wishes the Fed would take a more dovish stance. Well, he took a step towards making that dovish position a reality this week as he has just appointed two notable doves to the Fed. One is Judy Shelton, an economic adviser to his 2016 campaign, who will now be on the Fed’s board. The other is Christopher Waller, who will be the head of research at the St. Louis Fed. Shelton has numerous times expressed extremely dovish views and has said she does not like the Fed’s way of setting rates and would instead prefer a market-set rate.
FINSUM: Shelton’s views are pretty revolutionary, so it seems like she could really shake things up.
(New York)
If you could time travel back to December, it would be hard to find anyone in the world that would have thought that six months later, ten-year Treasury yields would be back under 2%. The turnaround has been so stark and so dramatic, that it is hard to fathom. The yield is now at its lowest level since 2016, with investors fearful of the economy and anticipating several Fed rate cuts.
FINSUM: The big question is what this means. Consider that the yield curve has been inverted for over 90 days. This seems like a very clear recession signal, yet economic data continues to hold up.
(Washington)
There was a lot of anxiety yesterday about what the Fed might do. The big banks were taking the opposite side of markets, saying that the pace of rate cuts that investors expected were unrealistic. Then Fed chief Powell spoke and it became clear that markets were right, the Fed is completely dovish and has fallen in line with investor expectations. Powell signaled that rate cuts were on the immediate horizon, which has led markets to up their odds-making of a rate cut in July to 100%.
FINSUM: Powell was about as dovish as a central banker ever gets short of the middle of a crisis. For us this is quite an unusual situation—an economy doing well with both of the Fed’s dual targets being met, yet there is an undeniable sentiment towards cutting rates.
(New York)
Whether investors like it or not, a recession is coming. One of the key indicators is for a yield curve inversion to last 90 days or more. If it does so, a recession is highly likely in the next 12-18 months. Well, the first point of inversion began in March and we just crossed the 90-day threshold, which means that the strongest indicator of recession has just been triggered. Here are some tips to prepare: clear out garbage holdings from your portfolio (e.g. the stock tip from your brother in law six months ago), set aside cash and come up with a plan to buy stocks when certain thresholds are hit (e.g. a 25% decline in key indexes), pay down debt (it might not be this easy to do so again for awhile).
FINSUM: For all the talk we have heard over the last year about “this time is different”, the reality is that the strongest recession indicator known has just been triggered.
(New York)
The muni bond market is in a difficult place for investors. Demand is far outstripping supply, which means prices are high and yields low, leaving investors few opportunities to find value. However, few does not mean none, so here are some places to find good value municipal bonds. Airport muni bonds can be a good choice, as they tend to fair well in recessions and have very defensible funding sources (e.g. state and local governments). Toll-road bonds are another good choice, as they have very strong credit characteristics (only two have defaulted since 1970). Toll roads in San Francisco, New York, Oklahoma, and Maine are particularly good bets as there are few options for drivers to avoid them.
FINSUM: These seem like well-thought out and defensible choices.
(New York)
More some time now, bonds have been sending worrying signals to investors. The huge plunge in yields has been seen as a warning sign that the economy may be headed south. However, more recently, fixed income is sending more comforting signals. In particular, the recent narrowing of corporate bond spreads. Bond spreads had been rising for some time, but have leveled off recently, showing fixed income investors are not as worried about the economy and corporate performance. The overall spread is still well below where it was in the 2015-2016 growth scare.
FINSUM: The leveling off of spreads is a good sign that some stability is coming back to the market.
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(New York)
You may normally think of it in terms of stocks, but “buy low, sell high” applies to bonds just as much, and that is a good way to think of the market right now. With yields having fallen so far since last year, one strategist said it was time to accept the “the present the Fed has given us”, and swap out bonds for floating rate securities, which have lagged this rally. The scale of returns in the bond market is impressive. For instance, the iShares 20+ year Treasury Bond ETF has risen over 9% since the beginning of the year.
FINSUM: It seems unlikely to us that bond yields are going to drop much further, which means there is little reason to wait for further gains.
(New York)
Deutsche Bank is an uber dove. The bank has just come out saying it expects the Fed to make three full rate cuts before the end of the year. “Over the past month, downside risks to the outlook for the US economy and Fed have built”, said Deutsche Bank, continuing that a mix of different concerns, from the trade war to weak inflation, are pointing to “more negative outcomes”. Pimco thinks the Fed won’t cut this month, but that it may cut by 50 bp in July, saying “we wouldn’t expect Fed officials to wait for the economic data to confirm declining US growth — if they do, they could risk a more meaningful shock to economic activity”.
FINSUM: The odds of a downturn certainly seem higher than an upturn, which means the Fed is much more likely to cut than to hike. That said, three rate hikes in the next six months sounds a bit aggressive to us, especially because the Fed would want to leave some firepower if the economy really heads downward.
(New York)
With all of the volatility of the last months, bond ETFs are taking on a new life. As an asset class, bond ETFs have surged in popularity in recent years as a much easier and cheaper way of accessing bond market liquidity. Recently, bond ETFs have seen their role morph. Whereas they have often been seen as a safe haven from periods of volatility, they are now being used as a risk management tool, says the head of iShares U.S. Wealth Advisory Product Consulting at BlackRock.
FINSUM: So many of the newer bond ETFs are designed to thrive in volatile markets, not just provide a low volatility safe haven. This means they are more of a proactive than reactive product.
(New York)
Jay Powell, head of the Fed, has been working on a year-long project to overhaul one of the Fed’s most important goals. That goal is full employment. The Fed only has two mandates, stable prices in the economy, and maximum employment. Yet the definition of maximum employment is now up for debate. At the core of the consideration is the idea that having a job is different than having a good job. The difference between the two means the Fed may use a different calculation for measuring employment. That potential change has huge implications, as it would likely lead to looser monetary policy both in the immediate future and further out.
FINSUM: We think there is a big difference between the quality of different jobs in the economy which needs to be accounted for by the Fed. The current way of measuring employment was designed when most jobs were permanent and full-time, but with the rise of the gig economy, measuring methods need to shift to account for the changing nature of the labor market.