Month: October 2017

Greece – Part II: Xi Jinping Meets Marco Polo

This is the second article in a three-part series on Greece. Our objective is to solve the mystery of the missing keys to Greece’s next economic boom. In the prelude to this article, we alluded to the fact that we are beginning to see an increasing number of signs that point to an economic uptick in Greece. In this article, we will focus on two key areas that we think will offer the biggest delta on Greece’s next economic boom: Trade and Tourism.

As a country opens itself to connect with new partners, its ports of entry need to be tweaked to better reflect this new relationship. Significant investments will be needed in both ports and airports over the next several years primarily driven by the need to expand to cater for any meaningful increase in the volumes of trade and/or travel.

In the privatization spree of the past years, Greece has privatized its biggest port and most of its airports. Alas! The keys to Greece’s next economic boom are not held by the Greeks; they are firmly in the hands of the Chinese and the Germans.

Please click here to read the article.

An Inflation Surprise – Invoking Volcker

Lately, there has been a lot of speculation on who the next US Federal Reserve chairperson will be. Many articles have been written speculating, opining, polling, and inferring the likely outcome as well as likely policy implications; we will not waste our time theorizing the same. Instead, we will focus on the technical aspects of the US treasury futures market and the underlying dynamics of US wage and inflation data.

Our view is that we could be due for an inflation surprise. Interest rate sensitive assets could be vulnerable, the slope of the US yield curve could steepen quite dramatically, and the reflation trade could be back with a vengeance.

Please click here to view the presentation.

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