- Markets are swayed by small changes in news but on the whole the world economy is more or less ticking along nicely with growth slightly below 2%. Barring major events this is set to rise somewhat next year. Growth in the US is around 2.2% and accelerating while growth in Europe is around 0.8% and more or less stable. Japanese growth is basically stalling. China is growing at around 7.3% but is still supported by excessive credit expansion, which will need to be managed down with consumer consumption filling the gap.
- Japan just posted a very weak 3rd quarter with the economy shrinking by 1.6% year-on-year. The hoped for pick-up of consumer consumption after the VAT increase in April did not materialise. The third arrow of Abenomics, structural reform to boost competitiveness, has not even been removed from the quiver. Perhaps the recently called for dissolution of parliament will allow this third arrow to be released (the prior two arrows were: massive fiscal stimulus and aggressive monetary easing).
- In Europe the Ukrainian situation remains unresolved, with the EU and Russia applying sanctions, hurting both sides. Growth in the Eurozone is however still positive and more importantly unemployment is slowly declining. European banks have been reluctant to increase lending prior to the ECB’s Capital adequacy test. Which by the way came up with a pretty good picture for Eurozone banks as a whole with only a few banks failing the test, most notably in Italy with one very large bank, Monte dei Paschi, needing to raise capital. There is a school of thought that reasons that now the test is behind us and it is known how the ECB will judge the banks there could be room for the stronger banks to increase lending, which is exactly what the ECB wants.
- In the US Q3 growth came in at an annual rate of 3.9%. US year-on-year growth would likely have been closer to 3% than the current 2.2% had the winter been milder at the start of 2014. US unemployment has seen a sharp decline from 7.2% in October 2013 to 5.8% at the end of October 2014. As unemployment declines further, wage pressure is expected to increase, which at some point will trigger the FED to start tightening. Expectations are this will be toward the end of 2015. 2015 should see growth picking up to the 3% level. …
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