Category: Financial Markets

The US is healing but we can’t even admit we’re ill

From The NewDaily.

The Federal Reserve’s widely anticipated rate rise is a reminder that while the US has learned from its housing market crash, our political leaders have created a record bubble of mortgage debt by shying away from reform.

When Fed chair Janet Yellen announced Thursday morning (Australian time) the fed-funds rate had risen to a new target range of 0.75 to 1 per cent, it caused barely a stir in markets. The New York Stock Exchange rose 0.8 per cent, as the Fed signalled future rate rises are likely to arrive sooner than previously expected.

These days the Fed telegraphs each move so effectively that markets no longer ask ‘will they move or not?’, but more ‘does that move reflect what’s really happening in the economy?’

Yes, with its years of super low rates, the Fed did set the scene for the 2009 housing collapse that hit global markets like a tsunami. But its three rate rises since the GFC have been spot on – late enough to avoid choking the recovery, but early enough to prevent inflation getting out of hand.

At a press conference Ms Yellen said the Fed is pushing rates back towards “normal” levels because the US economy has returned to reasonable health – growing at a “moderate pace”.

Meanwhile, Australia’s rates remain at historic lows. So what are we doing wrong?

The biggest reason we’re not seeing US-style growth is, gallingly, entirely self-imposed. Our political leaders have skewed the economy heavily towards real estate investing.

The vast sums of capital tied up in housing could be establishing new businesses, or backing the expansion of existing ones. Instead, we’re a nation hypnotised by capital gains that thinks buying and selling the same houses back and forth is a productive industry.

It all began in 1999, when treasurer Peter Costello cut capital gains tax to a rate well below the personal tax rates of middle- and upper-middle class Australians. It was one of the most economically harmful policies ever dreamt up in Canberra.

It did not take the nation’s accountants long to point out to clients that investing in a property, negatively gearing it for a few years, and then banking the capital gain at the new rate would slash the investor’s tax bills.

During the same period, the US was experiencing a credit bubble for different reasons – super low rates, plus the advent of sub-prime mortgages.

When the early ‘sub-prime’ phase of the GFC finally began to be felt, US house prices tumbled. And when the sub-prime crisis worked its way through the banking system, global stock markets crashed too.

Whereas the US learned from this and started rebuilding, we arrested our correction and did everything possible to keep the credit bubble growing.

As the share market tanked in 2009, Australian policy makers decided that the sacred cow of house prices must be protected at all costs. The 2009 first home buyer’s grant kickstarted that defence, and was topped up by most state governments too.

Even though the Rudd government’s own tax review – the Henry Tax Review – had recommended reining in negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount, all that was ignored.

The tax lurks stayed, gleefully maintained by the Abbott and Turnbull governments, and the RBA joined in by cutting interest rates that blew the credit bubble larger still.

The lack of action by politicians has pushed responsibility for reining in the bubble to the Australian Prudential Regulatory Authority, which imposed a fairly weak ‘speed limit’ on credit growth two years ago.

And now the RBA itself is threatening to put more “sand in the gears” of the credit machine.

It’s all too little, too late.

Australia, having ‘escaped’ the house price collapse that swept through so many nations in 2009, is now stuck in a self-imposed debt bubble.

Fed Lifts Rates Again

No surprise that the Fed lifted the Federal Fund Rate to 3/4 to 1 percent, it had been so well telegraphed. They point to ongoing accommodative financial conditions and the statement is quite dovish actually, so the rate of continued adjustment will be slow, and they have not rolled into the forecasts any upside from Trump’s policies.

The knock on effect will be significant, with further rises in the international capital market interest rates likely in response. The benchmark T10 bond yield is higher, once again but the market had already locked in the expected rise. The US dollar dropped.

The DOW was up after the news.

The AU Dollar was up, unexpectedly.

The Fed move will likely have a flow on effect to the Australian banks international funding costs (30-40% of the majors funds comes from this source), so expect continues upward pressure on mortgage rates here.

So far owner occupiers have seen out of cycle rates rises in the 20-30 basis point range, whilst investors have seen larger moves, up 50-60 basis points for variable loans. There is more to come.

Information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in February indicates that the labor market has continued to strengthen and that economic activity has continued to expand at a moderate pace. Job gains remained solid and the unemployment rate was little changed in recent months. Household spending has continued to rise moderately while business fixed investment appears to have firmed somewhat. Inflation has increased in recent quarters, moving close to the Committee’s 2 percent longer-run objective; excluding energy and food prices, inflation was little changed and continued to run somewhat below 2 percent. Market-based measures of inflation compensation remain low; survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations are little changed, on balance.

Consistent with its statutory mandate, the Committee seeks to foster maximum employment and price stability. The Committee expects that, with gradual adjustments in the stance of monetary policy, economic activity will expand at a moderate pace, labor market conditions will strengthen somewhat further, and inflation will stabilize around 2 percent over the medium term. Near-term risks to the economic outlook appear roughly balanced. The Committee continues to closely monitor inflation indicators and global economic and financial developments.

In view of realized and expected labor market conditions and inflation, the Committee decided to raise the target range for the federal funds rate to 3/4 to 1 percent. The stance of monetary policy remains accommodative, thereby supporting some further strengthening in labor market conditions and a sustained return to 2 percent inflation.

In determining the timing and size of future adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate, the Committee will assess realized and expected economic conditions relative to its objectives of maximum employment and 2 percent inflation. This assessment will take into account a wide range of information, including measures of labor market conditions, indicators of inflation pressures and inflation expectations, and readings on financial and international developments. The Committee will carefully monitor actual and expected inflation developments relative to its symmetric inflation goal. The Committee expects that economic conditions will evolve in a manner that will warrant gradual increases in the federal funds rate; the federal funds rate is likely to remain, for some time, below levels that are expected to prevail in the longer run. However, the actual path of the federal funds rate will depend on the economic outlook as informed by incoming data.

The Committee is maintaining its existing policy of reinvesting principal payments from its holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in agency mortgage-backed securities and of rolling over maturing Treasury securities at auction, and it anticipates doing so until normalization of the level of the federal funds rate is well under way. This policy, by keeping the Committee’s holdings of longer-term securities at sizable levels, should help maintain accommodative financial conditions.

Voting for the FOMC monetary policy action were: Janet L. Yellen, Chair; William C. Dudley, Vice Chairman; Lael Brainard; Charles L. Evans; Stanley Fischer; Patrick Harker; Robert S. Kaplan; Jerome H. Powell; and Daniel K. Tarullo. Voting against the action was Neel Kashkari, who preferred at this meeting to maintain the existing target range for the federal funds rate.

The Next Big Short?

From Bloomberg.

Wall Street speculators are zeroing in on the next U.S. credit crisis: the mall.

It’s no secret many mall complexes have been struggling for years as Americans do more of their shopping online. But now, they’re catching the eye of hedge-fund types who think some may soon buckle under their debts, much the way many homeowners did nearly a decade ago.

Like the run-up to the housing debacle, a small but growing group of firms are positioning to profit from a collapse that could spur a wave of defaults. Their target: securities backed not by subprime mortgages, but by loans taken out by beleaguered mall and shopping center operators. With bad news piling up for anchor chains like Macy’s and J.C. Penney, bearish bets against commercial mortgage-backed securities are growing.

In recent weeks, firms such as Alder Hill Management — an outfit started by protégés of hedge-fund billionaire David Tepper — have ramped up wagers against the bonds, which have held up far better than the shares of beaten-down retailers. By one measure, short positions on two of the riskiest slices of CMBS surged to $5.3 billion last month — a 50 percent jump from a year ago.

“Loss severities on mall loans have been meaningfully higher than other areas,” said Michael Yannell, the head of research at Gapstow Capital Partners, which invests in hedge funds that specialize in structured credit.

Nobody is suggesting there’s a bubble brewing in retail-backed mortgages that is anywhere as big as subprime home loans, or that the scope of the potential fallout is comparable. After all, the bearish bets are just a tiny fraction of the $365 billion CMBS market. And there’s also no guarantee the positions, which can be costly to maintain, will pay off any time soon. Many malls may continue to limp along, earning just enough from tenants to pay their loans.

But more and more, bears are convinced the inevitable death of retail will lead to big losses as defaults start piling up.

The trade itself is similar to those that Michael Burry and Steve Eisman made against the housing market before the financial crisis, made famous by the book and movie “The Big Short.” Often called credit protection, buyers of the contracts are paid for CMBS losses that occur when malls and shopping centers fall behind on their loans. In return, they pay monthly premiums to the seller (usually a bank) as long as they hold the position.

This year, traders bought a net $985 million contracts that target the two riskiest types of CMBS, according to the Depository Trust & Clearing Corp. That’s more than five times the purchases in the prior three months.

Dying Malls

Sold in 2012, the mortgage bonds have a higher concentration of loans to regional malls and shopping centers than similar securities issued since the financial crisis. And because of the way CMBS are structured, the BBB- and BB rated notes are the first to suffer losses when underlying loans go belly up.

“These malls are dying, and we see very limited prospect of a turnaround in performance,” according to a January report from Alder Hill, which began shorting the securities. “We expect 2017 to be a tipping point.”

Banks Account for Half of the Australia’s Total Dividends

The Henderson Global Dividend Index found that total dividend payouts across all geographies rose a little – by 0.1 per cent – to reach US$1.154 trillion in 2016, reflecting flat profits. They are predicting a headline growth rate of 0.3 per cent in 2017 with global dividends forecast to reach US$1.158 trillion. The index covers the world’s largest 1,200 firms, representing 90% of global dividends paid.

Strongest sectors were utilities, healthcare and technology, weakest were energy and mining sectors. Finance contributed 23 per cent of the total paid.

In Australia total dividends were US$41.8 billion, down 10.1 per cent on 2015. They say Australian dividends are more reliant on the payouts from just a few large stocks than any other developed country and is the largest payer in Asia Pacific excluding Japan, making up almost two-fifths of the total.

The report says declines in the mining sector inflicted the most damage, with dividend payouts down US$4.5 billion year-on-year. After adjusting for a slightly stronger Australian dollar, the underlying fall from the total market was 12.2 per cent. This included big dividend cuts from Woolworths and Woodside Petroleum.

But their next comment is important:

Together the banks account for half of the country’s total dividends, while CBA alone is responsible for $1 in every $5 distributed.

CBA was the 12th largest dividend payer in the world, with HSBC in 6th place in the rankings. These are the two highest placed finance sector companies.

Think about the implications of this given the talk about corporate tax cuts. Much of the benefit will flow to a small  number of larger companies, and many of these have high numbers of overseas investors. So the flow of “stimulation” into the local economy is likely to be very small.

The North American dividend payments of US$443.7 billion grew at 0.5 per cent because of a series of special dividends and index changes, though underlying growth was 3.9 per cent. The USA accounted for two-fifths of global payouts.

 

The possible impact of the Brexit on the financial landscape

Dr Andreas Dombret Member of the Executive Board of the Deutsche Bundesbank spoke about the potential impact of the Brexit on the financial sector.

Let’s start with the potential impact of the Brexit on the financial landscape. First and foremost, this means talking about market access. We should not forget that this is a two-way street, and so I will talk about market access in both directions. But the centre of attention is certainly on market access for UK based financial institutions to the EU, as this potentially has the largest impact for banks and other financial institutions. It affects all institutions, both from the UK and the rest of the world, which currently use London as a hub for their continental European business.

The debate on market access was transformed in mid-January. Prime Minister May made it clear that the UK is looking for a clean break from the EU’s single market. For the financial industry, this means that the current model of using London as a gateway to Europe is likely to end. Banks from third countries need a licensed entity inside the European Economic Area to gain access to the whole area, known as “passporting”. Shortly before the Prime Minister’s speech, CityUK already dropped demands for maintaining access through passports.

Instead, many are now hoping for an equivalence decision to fill the gap left by passporting rights. If the European Commission deems the regulatory and supervisory regime in the UK to be equivalent to that in the EU, market access would be partly retained. However, I am rather sceptical about whether equivalence decisions – may they be likely or not – offer a sound footing for long-term location decisions of banks. Equivalence is truly different from single market access.

There are three major drawbacks to equivalence decisions. First, they only cover the wholesale business of banks. Second, given the fact that banks need time to build up a new entity elsewhere, an equivalence decision would have to be taken quite soon to actually have a bearing on the location decisions of banks. Third, equivalence decisions are reversible, so banks would be forced to adjust to a new environment in the event that supervisory frameworks are no longer deemed equivalent. These drawbacks lead me to the overall conclusion that equivalence decisions are not a reliable substitute for passporting.

So it seems that the prospects for EU market access through the UK look rather dim. To ease the pressure on financial institutions, a transition period could help. It would reduce risks and increase planning security for banks, which would be economically beneficial. Furthermore, it could support a smooth relocation process by taking pressure off both supervisors and banks, for example by making “first mover advantages” less important. This being said, transition periods would be a politically sensitive topic in the negotiations, and it is unclear how likely such an agreement might be.

As mentioned earlier, we should not forget about the access of European banks to the UK, which is also an important issue. For German banks, for example, the UK is the second-most important foreign market, right after the US. It will be up to the UK Prudential Regulation Authority to decide under what circumstances European banks can retain access to the UK. Whether the UK would be prepared to unilaterally grant access for EU financial institutions in order to retain the attractiveness of London as a financial centre, remains an open question. And let me add that it is of course not regulation alone that plays a role when European banks decide on opening a branch or a subsidiary in the UK. It is also a question of what kind of entity their counterparties and clients want to do business with.

Let me summarise the prospects for market access, at least from my point of view. Continued passporting rights are rather unlikely, and an equivalence decision would be a somewhat imperfect substitute. A transition period could ease some of the pressure, but it clearly is a sensitive issue.

Could a free trade agreement be the solution? According to their Brexit white paper, the UK government will strive for an ambitious free trade agreement with the EU as a long-term solution. But regardless of the fact that negotiating comprehensive free trade agreements is an arduous and time-consuming task, financial services are an especially tricky area. So far, the EU has never fully integrated finance in its free trade agreements with third countries.

Where does this lead us? So far, while acknowledging and accepting the divorce, policymakers are trying to find ways to hold the UK and EU economic areas and jurisdictions together. And they will continue trying so. The reason is that most of us are convinced that harmonised rules eliminate unnecessary frictions and act as a powerful catalyst for business across national borders – for the real economy as well as the financial sector. However, looking at the facts that I’ve just laid out we also have to acknowledge that it is at least questionable whether this undertaking will be easily achieved. Financial institutions should take into consideration that, in the end, there might well be two separate jurisdictions in which they operate, and that these jurisdictions might diverge over time – or instantly, once the divorce has gone through.

Global economy ‘on a knife edge’

From InvestorDaily.

In its First Half Outlook for 2017, fixed income research house BondAdviser said fiscal policy promises by US President Donald Trump have shifted deflationary market expectations back into “normal” territory.

Investors have regained confidence that inflation could finally be returning to global markets that appeared to be mired in deflation, said the report.

But the execution of fiscal stimulus policies by the new US president will be crucial to maintaining market confidence, said BondAdviser.

“Our analysis suggests the biggest issue for these policies will be choices the [US] Federal Reserve makes in regard to raising interest rates in the face of an arguably larger debt obligation,” said the report.

“As a general rule, central banks do not anticipate inflation (albeit market expectations are observed) but will wait until it actually emerges. Actual core inflation
(monthly) is only now in line with the Fed’s target average inflation rate of 2.00 per cent.”

However, inflationary pressures will only persist if wage growth continues – something that is not guaranteed given the “structural headwinds” that technological advancements pose for the labour market.

“The global economy is poised on a knife-edge between inflation and deflation. The inflationary path could take hold, based on a combination of government spending (i.e. deficits) and low interest rates,” said BondAdviser.

“Conversely, the deflationary pressures could prevail, based on fundamental factors such as a strong US dollar, deleveraging, technology and Fed tightening.”

Trump to Order Dodd-Frank Review, Halt Obama Fiduciary Rule

From Bloomberg.

President Donald Trump will order a sweeping review of the Dodd-Frank Act rules enacted in response to the 2008 financial crisis, a White House official said, signing an executive action Friday designed to significantly scale back the regulatory system put in place in 2010.

Trump also will halt another of former President Barack Obama’s regulations, hated by the financial industry, that requires advisers on retirement accounts to work in the best interests of their clients. Trump’s order will give the new administration time to review the change, known as the fiduciary rule.

Taken together, the actions are designed to lay down the Trump administration’s approach to financial markets, with an emphasis on removing regulatory burdens and opening up investor options, said the White House official, who briefed reporters on condition of anonymity.

The orders are the most aggressive steps yet by Trump to loosen regulations in the financial services industry and come after he has sought to stock his administration with veterans of the industry in key positions. His plans are sure to face fierce criticism by Democrats who charge that Trump is intent on undoing changes designed to protect everything from average investors to the global banking system.

He also could face a backlash from some of his own supporters, whose distrust of big banks and the financial industry helped fuel the populist anger that propelled Trump to the White House.

Banks ‘Shackled’

Trump is scheduled to issue the directives at a signing ceremony around noon following a meeting of more than a dozen top corporate executives led by Blackstone Group LP Chief Executive Officer Steve Schwarzman. Gary Cohn, director of Trump’s National Economic Council, is meeting with House Financial Services Committee members Friday morning, said two people familiar with his schedule.

Cohn said Friday on Fox Business that the executive orders are intended to relieve restrictions and scrutiny that post-crisis regulations have put on banks, and that firms have been forced to “hoard capital” rather than lend it out to their clients.

“All banks have been shackled,” Cohn said. “We need to get banks back in the lending business.”

On Monday, Trump promised to do “a big number” on the Dodd-Frank Act during a meeting with small business owners. He said the law had damaged the country’s “entrepreneurial spirit” and limited access to needed credit.

“Regulation has actually been horrible for big business, but it’s been worse for small business,” the president said. “Dodd-Frank is a disaster.”

What’s the problem with Dodd-Frank? — a Q&A explains

Trump’s Treasury secretary nominee, Steven Mnuchin, will meet with members of the Financial Stability Oversight Council and report back on what changes the administration should take to alter Dodd-Frank, the official said. Particular attention will be paid to the Volcker Rule limits on banks making speculative bets with their own funds, a restriction promoted by former Federal Reserve Chairman Paul Volcker.

Immediate Impact

The official wouldn’t say how long the Treasury Department would have to complete its review, but did say that the administration would be looking for ways to make an immediate impact, including through administrative changes and personnel decisions.

Trump’s directive also starts the process of stalling the so-called fiduciary rule — set to take effect in April — that the Obama administration said would protect millions of retirees from being steered into inappropriate high-cost or high-risk investments that generate bigger profits for brokers.

The review will include examining making personnel changes at financial regulators as a way of accomplishing the administration’s objectives, the official said. They declined to answer a question on whether Trump would try to fire Richard Cordray, the director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. The official did say the administration believed that some of the rules created under Dodd-Frank may have been unconstitutional, including the creation of new agencies, an apparent

Asked Monday about whether Trump would retain Cordray in his position, White House press secretary Sean Spicer declined to answer. Mnuchin said during his congressional testimony that he believed the CFPB as a whole should be preserved but that Congress should take more direct control of its budget.

The Trump administration doesn’t believe Dodd-Frank measures, including the Volcker Rule, addressed real issues in the financial system, the official said. The president’s team also believes the Labor Department fiduciary rule was unnecessarily restricting investor choice without providing necessary consumer protection, the official said.

Republican lawmakers and some financial firms say the fiduciary rule is deeply flawed, arguing that it will restrict options for consumers and result in some savers being denied advice on their retirements. Trump will call for the Labor Department to stop and review the regulation in its entirety.

While the review will be undertaken independently by the Labor Department, the White House aide signaled that the president was expecting significant change.

Broader Overhaul

Delaying implementation of the Labor Department rule is the first step Republicans and the finance industry are eyeing as part of a broader overhaul of the measure. GOP Lawmakers have argued that the Securities and Exchange Commission, not the Labor Department, should oversee and regulate any changes related to financial firms.

Banks, asset managers and insurers have been fighting the fiduciary rule ever since the Labor Department approved it last year, saying the regulation could raise the costs of providing advice and make it harder to serve lower-income clients. Business groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and American Council of Life Insurers have sued to try to block it.

Still, representatives of some financial services companies said they planned to change practices to meet the regulation’s standard even if it is halted.

“We plan to go forward with the majority of the work we’ve done,” Bill Morrissey, managing director of business development at LPL Financial Holdings Inc., said in an interview before Trump’s order was disclosed. “What investors want is more transparency and lower fees.”

Morgan Stanley, one of the biggest U.S. brokerages, said on Jan. 26 it plans to move ahead with changes designed to comply with the rule, despite uncertainty over whether the regulation will be implemented. Insurers including American International Group Inc. and Principal Financial Group Inc. stressed after Trump’s victory that they would continue to forge ahead as though the rules would be carried out.

“My expectation is that a lot of firms are going to continue installing a best-interest standard, regardless,” said Brian Graff, chief executive officer of the American Retirement Association, a group that represents pension administrators and plan advisers.

Bank platforms ‘squeezing’ fund managers

From InvestorDaily.

Too much fund manager value is being “eaten up” by the high administration service fees of the major platforms, argues the ASX.

Speaking to InvestorDaily, ASX senior manager for investment products Andrew Campion said the investment management value chain should be more aligned with the people who actually generate wealth for investors – fund managers.

“We feel that presently too much value is eaten up by administration services. It’s not the actual person or firm that’s generating wealth for the end client,” Mr Campion said.

“If you squeeze the fund manager they just have less money to spend on research and less money to incentivise their staff,” he said.

This conviction is reflected in the relatively low fee ASX charges fund managers for inclusion on the mFund settlement service: 1.4 basis points (bps), or 0.014 per cent.

“If you look on a PDS for a fund manager and you see their expense ratio is 70 bps, 1 per cent or 1.2 per cent – they might be getting far less when they’re on a platform. Sometimes less than half as much,” Mr Campion said.

Sometimes a fund manager using larger platforms can be “squeezed” down to a fee of as low as 15 basis points “even though their direct retail fee structure is 70-80 bps or 1 per cent”.

“When we talk to managers, they’re staggered that they get to keep all of their fees,” Mr Campion said.

“We don’t feel like having a website that you can log into and have statements generated should cost 100 bps.”

There are now 170 products available on the mFund settlement service, with total funds under management (FUM) amounting to $250 million (up from $110 million 12 months earlier).

The ASX recently received approval from ASIC to include longer-form PDS products on mFund, in addition to shorter-form PDS products.

Longer-form PDS products, which include hedge funds, make up 20 per cent of the approximately $300 billion Australian retail fund management sector and are likely to be attractive to the mostly self-directed investors who use mFund, Mr Campion said.

“Although it’s only 20 per cent of the overall pie, we think as these funds come onto the platform it will be much more than 20 per cent of the mFund business,” he said.

Of the total $250 million in FUM on mFund, 40 per cent of it is self-directed and 60 per cent comes through advised channels, Mr Campion said.

Eighty per cent of the users of mFund are SMSFs, he added.

FED Holds Rate This Month

The FED held their benchmark rate today, whilst still leaving the door open for rises later.

Information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in December indicates that the labor market has continued to strengthen and that economic activity has continued to expand at a moderate pace. Job gains remained solid and the unemployment rate stayed near its recent low. Household spending has continued to rise moderately while business fixed investment has remained soft. Measures of consumer and business sentiment have improved of late. Inflation increased in recent quarters but is still below the Committee’s 2 percent longer-run objective. Market-based measures of inflation compensation remain low; most survey-based measures of longer-term inflation expectations are little changed, on balance.

Consistent with its statutory mandate, the Committee seeks to foster maximum employment and price stability. The Committee expects that, with gradual adjustments in the stance of monetary policy, economic activity will expand at a moderate pace, labor market conditions will strengthen somewhat further, and inflation will rise to 2 percent over the medium term. Near-term risks to the economic outlook appear roughly balanced. The Committee continues to closely monitor inflation indicators and global economic and financial developments.

In view of realized and expected labor market conditions and inflation, the Committee decided to maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 1/2 to 3/4 percent. The stance of monetary policy remains accommodative, thereby supporting some further strengthening in labor market conditions and a return to 2 percent inflation.

In determining the timing and size of future adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate, the Committee will assess realized and expected economic conditions relative to its objectives of maximum employment and 2 percent inflation. This assessment will take into account a wide range of information, including measures of labor market conditions, indicators of inflation pressures and inflation expectations, and readings on financial and international developments. In light of the current shortfall of inflation from 2 percent, the Committee will carefully monitor actual and expected progress toward its inflation goal. The Committee expects that economic conditions will evolve in a manner that will warrant only gradual increases in the federal funds rate; the federal funds rate is likely to remain, for some time, below levels that are expected to prevail in the longer run. However, the actual path of the federal funds rate will depend on the economic outlook as informed by incoming data.

The Committee is maintaining its existing policy of reinvesting principal payments from its holdings of agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in agency mortgage-backed securities and of rolling over maturing Treasury securities at auction, and it anticipates doing so until normalization of the level of the federal funds rate is well under way. This policy, by keeping the Committee’s holdings of longer-term securities at sizable levels, should help maintain accommodative financial conditions.

The Trump effect on bond markets and trade

From Investor Daily.

The Australian bond market is likely to feel the effects of US President Donald Trump’s protectionist trade stance both directly and indirectly, writes Nikko Asset Management’s James Alexander.

The emergence of China is clearly of great importance to the economic fortunes of Australia, and as a result it may be tempting to downplay, or even overlook, President Trump’s agenda and its impact on Australia.

While our largest import and export partner is now China, Australia will still be impacted by US trade policy both directly and, perhaps more importantly, indirectly.

The difficulty for investors, however, is the general uncertainty around future US trade policy, and the impact the Trump administration will have on financial markets.

Uncertainty around trade

While most of President Trump’s comments so far have been directed at China and Mexico, we do know that he is not a fan of trade deals negotiated by others.

Trade deals he has criticised in which Australia has been involved include the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), from which the US has just withdrawn, and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

The essential message here is that these are bad deals for the US, as opposed to future Trump-negotiated deals, which will of course be good for the US.

It is likely to be some time before we can reasonably assess the impact of changes to US trade policy with Australia directly, given their larger trade relationships are most certainly ahead of us in the queue.

This brings us to the indirect but significant impact of the US’ future trade relations with our biggest trading partner, China.

A tit-for-tat trade war is likely to be harmful to both the US and China, with Australia most certainly suffering some collateral damage.

It is too early to tell how this relationship will unfold but the early signs are not great, with President Trump taking every opportunity to criticise China.

These two economic heavyweights have plenty of tools to ‘penalise’ each other on trade, which could potentially hurt Australian trade in the process.

Rising bond yields

The other broad area where the impact of a Trump presidency is likely to be felt is in financial markets – more specifically, bond yields and foreign exchange rates.

Australia’s bond yields have historically been strongly correlated with US Treasury yields and this is likely to continue.

If the Trump agenda of lower taxes, increased infrastructure spending and more protectionist trade policy prove to be inflationary as we expect, US interest rates and bond yields are likely to be headed higher.

Australian bond yields will surely follow, as Commonwealth bond yields must remain globally competitive to ensure international investors continue to support our borrowing needs.

Another widely discussed by-product of Trump’s agenda is a stronger US dollar.

While the Australian dollar has fallen by around 2.5 per cent against the American currency, it has actually risen slightly on a trade-weighted basis since the presidential election in November.

This divergence, should it continue, will be one to watch carefully.

While a weaker Australian dollar would indeed help to counter any negative impact from higher bond yields, weakness that is mainly isolated to the US dollar is not nearly as helpful as weakness on a trade-weighted basis.

James Alexander is the co-head of global fixed income and head of Australian fixed income at Nikko Asset Management.