Currency
In-depth reporting on currency investing for our pension fund and asset management readers from IPE’s award-winning journalists.
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AnalysisShould pension funds increase their dollar hedge now?
US dollar’s downside risks have greatly increased under Trump’s second presidency. For Dutch schemes, upping protection is extra urgent during a time of transition to DC-based pension arrangements
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FeaturesFixed income, rates, currencies: Markets rocked by Trump’s sweeping tariffs plan
The world’s economy enters a new phase as the US administration escalates towards a global trade war, raising the prospect of a US recession and crashing global financial markets
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FeaturesCentral banks and cryptocurrency reserve: set for a breakthrough?
After courting the crypto community during his presidential campaign, Donald Trump issued an executive order in early March to create a US strategic bitcoin reserve, as well as a national digital assets stockpile of tokens other than bitcoin.
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FeaturesFixed income, rates, currencies: Trump’s tariff announcements weigh on sentiment
As tariff announcements garner huge amounts of media attention, financial market reactions have been muted. Participants are trying to beat off tariff fatigue and assess the best path through all the smoke and mirrors.
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FeaturesFixed income, rates, currencies: Uncertainty reigns as Trump 2.0 takes office
Now that Donald Trump has been installed as US president, there should be more clarity around some of the timings of his probable new policies.
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FeaturesFixed income, rates, currencies: Trump 2.0 sends global markets out of sync
Trump’s re-election prompted a rally in US assets, but elsewhere in global markets investors did not react positively
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FeaturesFixed income, rates, currencies: All eyes on Trump’s return
With the Republican Party now in control of both Senate and House, the leeway that President-elect Donald Trump will have to enact his pre-election policies could be considerable.
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FeaturesIPE Quest Expectations Indicator - December 2024
Bond expectations falling, equity mostly flat
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FeaturesSoft landing likely again for US economy
It has been more than a year since the attacks by Hamas in Israel and tensions in the Middle East remain high, with a rising impact on financial market sentiment.
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Asset Class ReportsLocal currency debt markets now more compelling
Bond yields are now more attractive because local central banks hiked interest rates sooner than their developed market counterparts
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FeaturesFixed income, rates, currencies: All eyes are on US elections
With so many important elections taking place this year, politics were likely to have an outsized influence on financial markets.
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FeaturesFears grow of US slowdown
US president Joe Biden’s decision to step aside was much murmured about following his disastrous performance in a debate with Donald Trump, but it was still a surprise when he announced his decision. However, market reactions were relatively muted, despite shaking pollsters’ predictions on who might now win the election.
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InterviewsPension funds on euro fixed income: navigating the rate cycle
We asked pension funds in Spain, Germany and Finland about their current views on European fixed income and credit as the ECB looks carefully at the timing and sequence of its rate cuts
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FeaturesAnalysts push back on rate cuts
Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell’s June press conference was, like most careful central bank-speak, open to interpretation. It was possibly slightly dovish with a hint of hawk. However, in the aftermath of the press conference, and following a few busy days of US economic data releases, many analysts have pushed back their forecasts for the number of interest rate cuts this year.
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FeaturesMarket predicts US soft landing - June 2024
A combination of Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell’s press conference and a slightly weaker-than-expected US April non-farm payrolls outcome succeeded in flipping the market back to a soft-landing narrative for the US economy. US Treasury bonds rallied sharply, taking other markets with them, while the yen weakened significantly against the dollar before recovering.
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FeaturesUS economy continues to surprise
The resilience of the US economy continues to confound observers. The Federal Reserve’s 11 hikes in interest rates over the course of 2022 and 2023 were implemented to rein in economic strength and to stifle inflation. Scroll forward to the second quarter of 2024 and both inflation and economic activity are still higher than expected.
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FeaturesReluctance to drop interest rates disappoints the markets
US rates markets entered the year enthusiastically pricing in over 160 basis points of cuts through 2024, and have since had to push back hard on both the timing and magnitude of interest rate cuts now expected by year-end.
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NewsSwiss pension fund seeks FX hedging currency provider for CHF1.7bn
Interested managers have until 13 March to participate and the pension fund is looking to start implementation from September
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FeaturesContrasting global economic growth fortunes
Economic growth patterns across the world paint a picture of contrasts, ranging from surprisingly robust in the US to soft and struggling in China, with the stagnant euro area narrowly avoiding a technical recession after posting zero GDP growth in the fourth quarter of 2023, following a 0.1% decline the previous quarter.
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FeaturesConflict and elections set to dominate the investor landscape
Middle Eastern tensions are running high, with violence flaring up across the wider region. Combined with the ongoing attritional destruction in Ukraine, this is impacting world trade, and it seems certain that international conflict will continue to be a source of great concern in 2024.
