Focus

Facebook and Amazon: intrusive, insatiable and invincible?

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Social media site’s bounce-back from data row shows tech sector still soaring. Facebook’s share price has risen an astonishing 35% in US dollar terms since its lows during the Cambridge Analytica data scandal in March – the latest sign of a hugely resilient tech sector. From an investment perspective, this… Read More »



Greece, the future remains bleak

Philippe Waechter -

After years of recession, the Greek economy is back to growth as the first graph shows. But the 2017 figure is very low while the rest of the Eurozone was in a strong expansion. Despite this improvement, the GDP level remains, at the end of 2017, 25% below the 2007… Read More »


China – US: the battle is just beginning

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Donald Trump’s threats to world trade are a desperate attempt from the US to maintain the country’s world economic leadership. The most dramatic shift over the past 20 years has taken place in China, as the country has displayed stellar growth and now accounts for an increasingly large percentage of… Read More »


Bank’s MPC to remain in wait-and-see mode

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Our call for an August Bank rate hike remains in play, and we do not expect any major announcements at this week’s Bank of England Monetary Policy Meeting, with the Bank acknowledging the weakness in first quarter data, while the gain in second quarter momentum remains modest. After the very… Read More »


A turbulent relationship for the equities/bonds couple

Marco Bonaviri -

Since the beginning of the year, US 10-year Treasury yields have increased from 2.4% to 3.1%, driving the year-to-date return in these bonds- which have been considered a safe asset for over 30 years now- beyond -4%. Furthermore, during Q1 2018, for only the fifth time in 20 years and… Read More »


Up and Down Wall Street

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Stocks can go up, down or sideways. Investors have seen Wall Street undergo a correction in February and since then the market has recovered somewhat without succeeding in reaching new highs. With some ups and downs, stock prices seem to be consolidating and have created a channel that is apparently… Read More »


May surveys point to continued, but lower, expansion

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May business surveys suggest some deceleration in economic activity, signaling aggregate GDP growth of 2% this quarter – still a solid reading. Looking at composite PMIs, we note that the relatively large declines in Germany (-1.5 points) and France (-2.4 points) contrast with the rest of the region, where a… Read More »


Italy’s President Throws the Dice

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Political events moved quickly in Italy over last weekend. After weeks of coalition negotiations between the Lega party and the Five Star Movement (M5S), the biggest winners from the general election in March, President Sergio Mattarella vetoed their proposed finance minister, who was seen by many as a risky choice… Read More »


Italy – The crisis is coming

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The adjustment on the upside is not over on Italian rates. The 10 year bond’s rate is converging to 3%. The spread with the German 10-year rate is now circa 270 bp. This also reflects a safe heaven effect for German bonds. With a rate at 3% % while the… Read More »