Don’t underestimate this economy
Despite worrisome headlines about the economy, recent data show only a modest loss of momentum.
Author: D. William Kohli
The fixed-income risks that we favor
We see more attractive fixed income risks outside of interest rates, in part because U.S. economic growth may warrant more rate hikes by the Fed.
Disaggregating the Aggregate Bond Index
The importance of the Barclays U.S. Aggregate Bond Index in the investment world might outweigh the attractiveness of its risk and reward profile.
If the economy grows, will workers come back?
A look at recent trends in the U.S. economy suggests that the potential U.S. growth rate is declining. The first reason for this conclusion is that investment has been so weak recently, which means the country’s capital stock has been growing only very slowly. Without investment growth, an economic growth cycle tends to be short,
Sequester will take a small bite from GDP
With the automatic spending cuts, or sequestration, required by the Budget Control Act of 2011 still on track to go into effect starting Friday, March 1, we believe it’s important to keep the full impact in perspective. Even if we do go into a sequestration mode in the United States, or get bogged down in
Fixed-income markets moving beyond deleveraging
It appears that the effects of the major deleveraging event in 2008 — punctuated by the collapse of Lehman Brothers — has finally shifted into a second phase. For the past four years, fixed-income investors have been influenced primarily by fear of another Lehman-type event, and this has affected pricing in general. Now we believe
Europe’s debt crisis — gauging the risks
While the European Central Bank has made progress, we believe, on managing near-term liquidity risk, long-term structural issues remain.
Fixed-income markets returning to normal
The level of market distress surrounding global macro risks has declined in the latter half of 2012, helping sentiment and trading conditions in fixed-income markets return to more normal levels similar to those seen before the 2008 financial crisis.
Markets put macro risks in perspective
Since the 2008 market dislocation, fixed-income investors have been prone to anticipate another major macroeconomic crisis, but there are signs developing that macro risks may be easing and more normal market conditions are taking root.