Research & News
Asset Allocation Weekly (August 30, 2019)
by Asset Allocation Committee As various permutations of the yield curve invert, projections of recession are increasing. One of our favorites, the 10-year T-note/fed funds yield curve, has been inverted for three months. This chart shows the history of this yield curve; since 1960, every recession was preceded by an inversion of this indicator. However, that… Read More »
Quarterly Energy Comment (August 27, 2019)
by Bill O’Grady The Oil Market Since June, oil prices have held within a range of $50 to $60 per barrel. After a sharp decline in prices from late May into early June, due in part to a contra-seasonal build in inventories, inventories fell and oil prices rebounded. Rising tensions with Iran added to the… Read More »
Weekly Geopolitical Report – Meet Boris Johnson (August 26, 2019)
by Patrick Fearon-Hernandez, CFA (Due to the Labor Day holiday, our next report will be published on September 9.) The great forest fires that consumed swaths of the West in recent years have finally revealed the danger from a century of excessive fire suppression. Humanity’s natural drive to control the environment has left forests overgrown… Read More »
Asset Allocation Weekly (August 23, 2019)
by Asset Allocation Committee Recession worries have increased due to falling long-duration interest rates and the short-lived inversion of the two-year/10-year T-note spread. Although this spread is important, it is merely one in a whole series of permutations of the yield curve. Our preferred measure is the 10-year/fed funds spread because it measures the long end… Read More »
Weekly Geopolitical Report – Weaponizing the Dollar: Part II (August 19, 2019)
by Bill O’Grady Weaponizing the Dollar: Part I In Part I, we began our analysis with a discussion of Mundell’s Impossible Trinity. We also covered the gold standard model and Bretton Woods model. This week, we will examine the Treasury/dollar standard and introduce what could be called Bretton Woods II. Finally, we will conclude with… Read More »
Asset Allocation Weekly (August 16, 2019)
by Asset Allocation Committee As the 10-year T-note yield tumbles, we are reaching a point where the market looks overvalued based on current fundamentals. Our yield model uses fed funds and the 15-year average of the yearly change in CPI[1] along with the JPY/USD exchange rate, oil prices, the yield on 10-year German bunds and the… Read More »
Weekly Geopolitical Report – Weaponizing the Dollar: Part I (August 12, 2019)
by Bill O’Grady Weaponizing the Dollar: Part I In July 1944, 44 allied nations gathered at the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods, NH to develop the structure for the economic and financial systems for the postwar world. The Bretton Woods agreement established a system of fixed exchange rates. Exchange rates were pegged to the… Read More »
Asset Allocation Weekly (August 9, 2019)
by Asset Allocation Committee Since the end of WWII, there have generally been three factors that have caused recessions. The first, and most important, is policy error. Although fiscal tightening can cause recessions, major tax increases have become less common. The usual source of policy error comes from the monetary side, where the central bank either… Read More »
Weekly Geopolitical Report – Turkey Lashing Out (August 5, 2019)
by Patrick Fearon-Hernandez, CFA Here at Confluence, we write a lot about the rise and fall of hegemonic states – those great nations that develop enough power and influence to dominate the global economy, or at least some region of it. These superpowers use their extraordinary military might and other levers to impose order on… Read More »