USD

US economic surprise indices are sitting at the highest levels since 2020 as incoming data keeps topping forecasts, defying expectations for a policy-induced slowdown. Upheaval in the US banking sector seems to have ended without inflicting lasting damage on lending conditions. Consumer demand remains remarkably robust. Core inflation is still high. Labour markets are hot. Financial conditions are accommodative, and asset prices are melting up.Yet after a record-breaking 11-year bull run, the greenback remains well below its September peak, and selling pressure has accelerated since mid-July’s softer-than-anticipated inflation print led markets to assume an imminent end to the Federal Reserve’s...

According to the precepts of Stephen Jen’s “dollar smile” theory, the greenback tends to rise in value during periods of extreme economic performance – on both ends of the spectrum – and fall in value during periods when the US is growing more slowly than its global counterparts. It seems that just such a “muddle through” scenario is set to unfold, with all of the major components of domestic demand showing signs of exhaustion after an outsized post-pandemic recovery. Fiscal policy at the state and local levels is still providing unexpected stability, and aggregate incomes are rising more quickly than...

In the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis, households and businesses in the United States deleveraged, and have thus far managed to keep debt levels relatively restrained. In contrast, private sector leverage has risen spectacularly – in both absolute and momentum terms – in countries like Australia, Canada, South Korea, and France, and in smaller economies like Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. In China, decades of unproductive investment and unrestrained credit creation have left policymakers struggling to manage ballooning debt burdens across the financial system. If global liquidity conditions worsen and borrowing costs remain stubbornly elevated, we suspect these vulnerabilities...