CoreMacro

The rally in Colombia’s financial markets has a short shelf life. The election will bring a right-wing government, but it cannot fix inflation, fiscal arithmetic, or balance-of-payments vulnerabilities. Use the near-term rally to downgrade Colombian fixed income and equities.

In Romania, large fiscal and current account deficits, high inflation, negative real rates, an overvalued exchange rate, and deteriorating growth point to budding currency devaluation. Investors should short the Romanian currency versus the euro and underweight Romanian local bonds, equities, and sovereign credit.

US stocks and bonds are on a collision course. Only a meaningful equity selloff is likely to pull bond yields considerably lower. Global equity risk-reward looks poor. The dollar will stay firm near term, but its medium- and long-term outlook remains bearish.

The divergence across frontier markets is likely to widen. Kenya, Kazakhstan, and Sri Lanka are well placed to outperform, while Pakistan is vulnerable. We offer several trade ideas to capture this divergence.

India is probably the most vulnerable among the G-20 economies should the Strait of Hormuz not reopen fully by the end of this month. Growth will slow, while inflation will rise materially. Investors should brace for further weakness in the currency and stock prices.

Global trade has held up despite US non-AI import volumes contracting by 25% over the past 12 months. The strength in global trade has concentrated in two areas: (1) imports of AI-related hardware and (2) developing countries’ imports, especially from China. Will these continue?

Hungary’s growth outlook has improved as the election of a new government will likely unlock significant EU funds for the country. Currency traders should go long the Hungarian forint / short US dollar.

Special Report

In this Special Report, we describe how inflation expectations are formed. We then demonstrate that steady state inflation expectations have un-anchored in the UK, are un-anchoring in Japan, and are at high risk of un-anchoring in the US. And we conclude with some implications for bond markets.

Outside Asian semiconductor producers, EM corporate earnings and profitability have seen little improvement. Despite the ceasefire in the Middle East, the medium-term outlook for EM stocks is still unattractive.

The Turkish financial markets will struggle in the very near term, but beyond that, the cyclical disinflation process will resume. Fixed-income investors should put Turkish 2-year local currencybonds on a ‘buy’ watch list.