If you’re approaching retirement, you’re probably thinking about how you’d like to access your pension savings. There will be lots of options available to you – but, as many households struggle with the cost of living crisis, the benefit of having a guaranteed, regular income may be increasingly difficult to ignore. Is now the perfect…
We ended last week with a slate of hawkish comments from central bankers – a reminder that they aren’t done tightening interest rates just yet and that market expectations for rate cuts later this year are probably much too soon, given the inflation outlook. From the ECB, Isabel Schnabel and Francois Villeroy de Galhau both…
China’s Central Economic Work Conference took place last week and this is one of the most important events of the year in terms of giving the public an indication of future plans. Beijing promised to “forcefully revive market confidence” in contrast to last year’s “revive the confidence of market entities” – so a little more…
The main event for markets this week is a busy diary for central bank policy decisions with the Federal Reserve, the ECB and the Bank of England all expected to raise interest rates. The ongoing rally in US equities ran into some headwinds on data pointing to continued high inflation and a still-tight job market,…
The key news story for markets on Friday was the US Non-farm Payrolls for November, which came in at 263k jobs added, well ahead of consensus at 200k. There was also an upward revision to the October reading from 261k to 284k. The unemployment rate nevertheless held firm at 3.7% and wage growth was also…
Today China developments are dominating headlines, with COVID frustrations boiling over as lockdowns triggered civil unrest in multiple cities including in Beijing and Shanghai – where police appeared to struggle to disperse crowds. The protests reflect the most direct challenge to party authority since Tiananmen Square in 1989 with protesters openly chanting for the CCP and President Xi to…
COP27 ended on Sunday with an agreement for richer countries to fund poorer nations, although details need to be agreed. There was also a failure by countries to agree to phase out fossil fuels, meaning commitments on emissions did not go further than the weakened Glasgow COP26 pledge to phase down polluting coal power and…
Although the inflation data last week was softer than expected, US CPI is still reverberating and has not materially changed higher-for-longer messaging from Federal Reserve officials. Fed Governor Waller today reiterated there is still a long way to go before concluding interest rate hikes, noting rates will stay high until inflation is closer to the…