US inflation – still a problem

 High inflation was rampant in 2022, eroding real income, disrupting the financial markets, and weighing on the economy. To tame it, the Federal Reserve (Fed) has been hiking interest rates since March 2022, by a cumulative 475bps till April 2023. It also started tapering around the same time. Although inflation was moderated, pushing it back to the 2% target still requires more work. Liquidity shrinking and high interest rates resulted in a banking crisis, prompting the Fed to slow interest rate hikes and even completely revise the direction of monetary policy. The 2023 outlook is gloomy, shadowed by the high interest environment, a still resilient labour market, volatile energy prices, and financial system instability.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Wall Street futures flat, global stocks stumble, oil slides as inflation, earnings loom large

 LONDON (Reuters) — Wall Street futures were flat while global shares remained red on Monday and investors, wary of central bank narratives, braced for U.S. inflation data and a corporate reporting season where robust results are needed to justify high valuations. Geopolitical tensions were also on the radar as disruptions in the Red Sea raised shipping costs in Europe, while the Israeli conflict with Hamas threatened to spread to Lebanon. European oil and gas stocks fell 1.9% on the STOXX 600 as crude prices dipped following sharp price cuts by top exporter Saudi Arabia and a rise in OPEC output. https://www.globalbankingandfinance.com/wall-street-futures-flat-global-stocks-stumble-oil-slides-as-inflation-earnings-loom-large/
Read more

Explainer-Why the $5.2 billion sale of Russia’s Yandex is significant

  www.globalbankingandfinance.com/explainer-why-the-5-2-billion-sale-of-russias-yandex-is-significant/ LONDON (Reuters) – A $5.2 billion cash and share deal to sell the key Russian assets of technology group Yandex, often labelled as “Russia’s Google”, to a consortium of Russian investors was announced on Monday after months of negotiations. Here’s why the deal is significant. RUSSIA’S LARGEST TECH ASSET Moscow has long sought to gain more influence over Yandex, set up in the dotcom boom in the late 1990s, as it became a key player in online services such as search and advertising, email, ride-hailing, e-commerce, cloud and streaming. The sale to a group of Russian investors would bring Yandex under the control of only Russian entities for the first time. Yandex, which went public on Nasdaq in 2011 through its Dutch-registered holding company Yandex NV, has a free-float of almost 88%, with many Western investors among its shareholders.
Read more

How an election-packed 2024 could swing world markets

 LONDON (Reuters) — Countries making up over 60% of the world’s economic output and more than half of its population hold elections this year. Taiwanese voters on Saturday swept the ruling Democratic Progressive Party’s presidential candidate Lai Ching-te into power, rejecting Chinese pressure to spurn him. And on Monday, U.S. Republican presidential candidates face the party’s first nominating contest in Iowa. Here’s a look at key elections in focus for markets, in roughly chronological order. 1/ EUROPE Dates: March 10 (Portugal), June 9 (Belgium), June 6–9 (European Parliament), autumn/winter (Croatia), November (Romania), to be confirmed (Austria) https://www.globalbankingandfinance.com/how-an-election-packed-2024-could-swing-world-markets/
Read more