Thoughts on the Market

This year is validating our call for a shorter but hotter economic cycle. As the indicators begin to point to a late-cycle environment, here’s how investors can navigate the change.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday, March 21st at 1:00 p.m. in New York. So let's get after it. 

A year ago, we published a joint note with our Economics and Cross Asset Strategy teams arguing this cycle would run hotter but shorter than the prior three. Our view was based on the speed and strength of the rebound from the 2020 recession, the return of inflation after a multi-decade absence and an earlier than expected pivot to a more hawkish Fed policy. Developments over the past year support this call - US GDP and earnings have surged past prior cycle peaks and are now decelerating sharply, inflation is running at a 40-year high and the Fed has executed the sharpest pivot in policy we've ever witnessed. 

Meanwhile, just 22 months after the end of the last recession, our Cross Asset team's 'U.S. Cycle' model is already approaching prior peaks. This indicator aggregates key cyclical data to help signal where we are in the economic cycle and where headwinds or tailwinds exist for different parts of the market.

With regard to factors that affect U.S. equities the most, earnings, sales and margins have also surged past prior cycle highs. In fact, earnings recovered to the prior cycle peak in just 16 months, the fastest rebound going back 40 years. The early to mid-cycle benefits of positive operating leverage have come and gone, and U.S. corporates now face decelerating sales growth coupled with higher costs. As such, our leading earnings model is pointing to a steep deceleration in earnings growth over the coming months. These negative earnings revisions are being driven by cyclicals and economically sensitive sectors - a setup that looks increasingly late cycle. 

Another key input to the shorter cycle view was our analysis of the 1940s as a good historical parallel. Specifically, excess household savings unleashed on an economy constrained by supply set the stage for breakout inflation both then and now. Developments since we published our report in March of last year continue to support this historical analog. Inflation has surged, forcing the Fed to raise interest rates aggressively in a credible effort to restore price stability. Assuming the comparison holds, the next move would be a slowdown and ultimately a much shorter cycle.

Further analysis of the postwar evolution of the cycle reveals another compelling similarity to the current post-COVID phase - unintended inventory build from over ordering to meet an excessive pull forward of demand. In short, we think the risk of an inventory glut is growing this year in many consumer goods, particularly in areas of the economy that experienced well above trend demand. Consumer discretionary and technology goods stand out in our view. 

Now, with the Fed raising rates this past week and communicating a very hawkish tightening path over the next year, our rate strategists are looking for an inversion of the yield curve in the second quarter. While curve inversion does not guarantee a recession, it does support our view for decelerating earnings growth and would be one more piece of evidence that says it's late cycle. 

In terms of our U.S. strategy recommendations, we continue to lean defensive and focus on companies with operational efficiency with high cash flow generation. This leads us to more defensive names with more durable earnings profiles that are also attractively priced. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show.

The U.S. Federal Reserve recently enacted its first interest rate hike in two years, but there is still more work to be done to counteract rising inflation and markets are watching closely.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape and how we put those ideas together. It's Friday, March 18th at 2:00 p.m. in London. 

On Wednesday, the U.S. Federal Reserve raised interest rates for the first time in two years. This is notable because of how much time has passed since the Fed last took action. It's notable because of how low interest rates still are, relative to inflation. And it's notable because rate increases, and decreases, by the Fed tend to lump together. Once the Fed starts raising or lowering rates, history says that it tends to keep doing so. 

Now, one question looming over the Fed's action this week could be paraphrased as, "what took you so long?" Since the Fed cut rates to zero in March of 2020, the U.S. stock market is 77% higher, U.S. home prices are 35% higher, and the U.S. economy has added over 5.7 million new jobs. Core consumer price inflation, excluding volatile food and energy prices, has risen 6.4% in the last year, indicative of demand for goods outpacing the ability of the economy to supply them at current prices, exactly what a hot economy implies. 

The reason the Fed waited was the genuine uncertainty around the impact of COVID on the economy, and the risk that new variants would evade vaccines or dash consumer confidence. But every decision has tradeoffs. Easy Fed policy has helped the U.S. economy recover unusually quickly, but that quick recovery now means the Fed has a lot more to do to catch up. 

Specifically, we think the Fed will need to raise the upper band of its policy rate, currently at 0.5%, to about 2.75% by the end of next year. This is more than the market currently expects, and we think outcomes here are skewed to the upside, with it more likely that rates end up higher than lower. 

My colleagues in U.S. interest rate strategy believe that this should cause U.S. rates to rise further, with 2 year bond yields rising most and ultimately moving higher than 10 year bond yields. It's rare for 2 year bonds to yield more than their 10 year counterpart, a so-called curve inversion. Nevertheless, this is what we expect. 

Now, one counter to this Fed outlook is that the U.S. economy simply can't handle higher rates, and that will force the Fed to stop hiking earlier. But we disagree. With a large share of household debt in the U.S. in the form of 30 year fixed rate mortgages, the impact of higher rates may actually be more muted than in the past, as the cost of servicing this debt won't change even as the Fed raises rates. 

Higher short-term interest rates and an inverted yield curve are one specific implication of these expectations. More broadly, inverted yield curves have historically been key signposts for increased risk of recession. While we think a recession is unlikely, the market could still worry about it, supporting U.S. defensive equities and investment grade over high yield credit. 

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The U.S. and its allies have frozen the Central Bank of Russia’s foreign currency reserves, leading to questions about the safety of FX assets more broadly and the centrality of the U.S. dollar to the international financial system.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Any references in this report to entities, debt or equity instruments, projects or persons that may be covered by such sanctions are strictly informational, and should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities, instruments or projects. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm James Lord, Head of FX and EM Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about global macro trends and how investors can interpret these trends for currency markets. It's Thursday, March 17th at 3:00 p.m. in London. 

Ever since the U.S. and its allies announced their intention to freeze the Central Bank of Russia's foreign exchange, or FX, reserves, market practitioners have been quick to argue that this would likely accelerate a shift away from a U.S. dollar based international financial system. It is easy to understand why. Other central banks may now worry that their FX reserves are not as safe as they once thought, and start to diversify away from the dollar. 

Yet, despite frequent calls for the end of the dollar based international financial system over the last couple of decades, the dollar remains overwhelmingly the world's dominant reserve currency and preeminent safe haven asset. But could sanctioning the currency reserves of a central bank the size of Russia's be a tipping point? Well, let's dig into that. 

The willingness of U.S. authorities to freeze the supposedly liquid, safe and accessible deposits and securities of a foreign state certainly raises many questions for reserve managers, sovereign wealth funds and perhaps even some private investors. One is likely to be: Could my assets be frozen too? 

It's an important question, but we need to remember that the U.S. is not acting alone with these actions. Europe, Canada, the UK and Japan have all joined in freezing the central bank of Russia's reserve assets. So, an equally valid question is: Could any foreign authority potentially freeze my assets? 

If the answer is yes, that likely calls into question the idea of a risk free asset that underpins central bank FX reserves in general, and not just specifically for the dollar and U.S. government backed securities. 

If that's the case, what could be the implications? Let me walk you through three. 

First would be identifying the safest asset. Reserve managers and sovereign wealth fund investors will need to take a view on where they can find the safest assets and not just safe assets, as the concept of the latter may have been seriously impaired. And in fact, the dollar and U.S. Government backed securities may still be the safest assets since the latest sanctions against the central Bank of Russia involve a broad range of government authorities acting in concert. 

A second implication is that political alliances could be key. These sanctions demonstrate that international relations between different states may play an important role in the safety of reserve assets. While the dollar might be a safe asset for strong allies of the U.S., its adversaries could see things differently. To put the dollar's dominance in the international financial system at serious risk, would-be challenges of the system would need to build strategic alliances with other large economies. 

Finally, is the on shoring of foreign exchange assets. Recent sanctions have crystallized the fact that there is a big difference between an FX deposit under the jurisdiction of a foreign government and one that you own on your home ground. While both might be considered cash, they are not equivalent in terms of accessibility or safety. So another upshot might be that reserve managers bring their foreign exchange assets onshore. 

One way of doing this is to buy physical gold and store it safely within the home jurisdiction. The same could be said of other FX assets, as reserve managers will certainly have access to printed U.S. dollars, Euros or Chinese Yuan banknotes if they are stored in vaults at home, though there could be practical challenges in making large transactions in that scenario. Bottom line, though, while these are all important notions to consider, in our view recent actions do not undermine the dollar as the safest global reserve asset, and it's likely to remain the dominant global currency for the foreseeable future. 

Thanks for listening! As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show. 

As oil prices rise across the globe, investors wonder if governments will continue to incentivize clean energy development or pivot to greater investment in traditional fossil fuels.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets. It's Wednesday, March 16th, at 10:00 a.m. in New York. 

With the conflict in Ukraine ongoing, many investors continue to ask questions about the U.S. and European policy response to the rising price of oil. In particular, many ask if governments will continue down the path of incentivizing clean energy development, or pivot to greater exploration of traditional fossil fuels. But as my colleague Stephen Byrd, who heads North America Power Utilities and Clean Energy Research, pointed out in a recent report, this is a false choice, and it's one that many policymakers are likely to reject in favor of embracing an "all of the above" strategy. 

It's important to understand that focusing only on traditional energy sources wouldn't solve the problem in the near term. For example, switching on any dormant U.S. oil production facilities would only replace a fraction of the oil that Russia produces, so fresh explorations ramp up production would be needed, and that could take a few years. The same could be said about natural gas. The U.S. Has the spare capacity to backfill with Europe imports from Russia, but Europe mostly doesn't have the facilities to accept liquefied natural gas shipped overseas from America. Germany has announced plans to build two liquefied natural gas terminals, but that could take years to complete. The point is, focusing on traditional energy sources alone is no quick fix for high energy prices and energy independence, and therefore there's little opportunity cost in also focusing on renewable energy development. For that reason, we think western governments are likely to include both clean energy and traditional investments in their strategy going forward. You see this echoed in the statements of policymakers, such as U.S. Climate Envoy John Kerry's recent comments that the US is committed to an "all of the above" energy policy. 

So what does it mean for investors? In short, expect energy companies of all types to have business to do with governments in the coming years. That includes traditional oil exploration companies, but also clean tech companies, as market beneficiaries. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague, or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show. 

As global markets face a rise in commodity prices due to geopolitical conflict, investors in Asia and EM equities will want to keep an eye on the divergence between commodity exporters and importers.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Any references in this report to entities, debt or equity instruments, projects or persons that may be covered by such sanctions are strictly informational, and should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities, instruments or projects. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Jonathan Garner, Chief Asia and Emerging Market Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley Research. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about geopolitical risk, commodity exposure, and how they affect our views on Asia and EM Equities. It's Tuesday, March the 15th at 8:00 p.m. in Hong Kong. 

The Russia Ukraine conflict is having a profound impact on the investment world in multiple dimensions. In this episode we focus on just two, commodity prices and geopolitical alignment, and what they mean for investors in Asia and emerging market equities. 

The major sanctions imposed by the U.S., U.K., European Union and their allies are focused not only on isolating Russia financially but depriving it, in some instances overnight and in others more gradually, of the ability to export its commodities. And Russia is a major producer of oil, natural gas, food and precious metals and rare minerals. Ukraine is also a major food exporter. In our coverage there's a sharp divergence between economies which are major commodity importers, and are therefore suffering a negative terms of trade shock as commodity prices rise, and those which are exporters and hence benefit. Major importers include Korea, Taiwan, China and India, all with more than a 5% of GDP commodity trade deficit. Meanwhile, Australia, Mexico, Brazil, Saudi Arabia, UAE and South Africa are all significant commodity exporters and stand to benefit. Australia's overall commodity trade surplus is the largest at 12% of GDP, and that is before the recent gains in price for almost everything which Australia produces and exports. 

Meanwhile, on the geopolitical risk front, we've been monitoring the pattern of voting on Russia's actions at the United Nations, where there have been both UN Security Council and General Assembly votes. Although none of the countries we cover actually voted with Russia on either occasion, two major countries, China and India, did abstain twice. South Africa abstained at the General Assembly. The UAE abstained in the Security Council, but then voted with the US and Europe in the General Assembly vote. This pattern of voting, in our mind, may have an impact in raising the equity risk premium, i.e. lowering the valuation, for China and to a lesser extent India in the current environment. 

All taken together, we are shifting exposure further towards commodity exporting markets and in particular those such as Australia, which are also geopolitically aligned with the major sources of global investor flows. We lowered our bear-case scenario values for China further recently and are turning incrementally more cautious on India. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today. 

This week the market turns to the Federal Reserve as it eyes challenges to growth while remaining committed to combating high inflation with its first rate hike of the tightening cycle.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday, March 14th at 11:00 a.m. in New York. So let's get after it. 

With all eyes on the Russian invasion of Ukraine, markets are likely to turn back towards the Fed this week as it embarks upon the first tightening of the cycle and the first rate hike since 2018. This follows a period of perhaps the most accommodative monetary support ever provided by the Federal Reserve, an extraordinary statement unto itself given the Fed's actions over the past few decades. 

When it comes to measuring how accommodative Fed policy is at the moment, we look at the Fed funds rate minus inflation, or the real short-term borrowing rate. Using this measure tells us that fed accommodation has been in a steady downtrend since the early 1980s. In fact, the real Fed funds rate has been in a remarkably well-defined channel for this entire period. Second, after reaching the low end of the channel in record time during the COVID recession, the real Fed funds rate has turned higher- albeit barely. That low was in November of last year, when Fed Chair Jerome Powell was renominated by President Biden, and he made it clear that the Fed was going to pivot hard on policy. It was no coincidence that this is exactly when expensive growth stocks topped and began what has been one of the largest and most persistent drawdowns in growth stocks ever witnessed. Finally, based on how low the Fed funds rate remains, the Fed has a lot of wood to chop to get this rate back to a more normal level. Furthermore, if Powell is truly committed to making monetary policy restrictive to fight inflation, expensive growth stocks remain vulnerable, in our view. 

Currently, the bond market is pricing in eight 25 basis point hikes over the next 12 months. If the Fed is successful in executing this expected path, it will have achieved the soft landing it seeks. Inflation will come down as the economy remains in expansion. However, we think that's a big if at this point. First, growth is already at risk as we enter 2022 due to the payback in demand lapsing government transfers, generationally high inflation and rising inventories at the wrong time. Now, the conflict in Ukraine is leading to even higher commodity prices, while the growth outlook deteriorates further. While we are likely to avoid an economic recession in the U.S., we can't say the same for earnings. We think the Fed will keep a watchful eye on the data, but air on the side of hawkishness given the state of inflation. This likely means a collision with equity markets this spring, with valuations overshooting to the downside. 

While short-term interest rates are still at zero, longer term treasury yields are now approaching a level that may offer some value for asset owners, even if they are unattractive on a standalone basis. This is especially true if one is now more concerned about growth like we are. Let's assume we're wrong about growth slowing, under such a view it's unlikely the Fed hikes faster than what is already priced into the bond market. Therefore, longer term rates are unlikely to raise much more by the time we know the answer to this growth question. Conversely, if we're right about growth slowing more than expected, longer term rates likely have room to fall and provide a cushion to equity portfolios. High quality investment grade credit may also offer some ballast given the significant correction in both rates and spreads. For equity investments, we continue to favor defensive quality stocks as well as companies with high operational efficiency. Yes, boring is still beautiful. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show.

With multiple countries now imposing sanctions, investors in Russian government bonds and currencies will need to consider their options as the risk of default rises.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Any references in this report to entities, debt or equity instruments, projects or persons that may be covered by such sanctions are strictly informational, and should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities, instruments or projects. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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James Lord: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm James Lord, Head of FX and EM strategy. 

Simon Waever: And I'm Simon Waever, Global Head of Sovereign Credit Strategy. 

James Lord: And on this special episode of Thoughts on the Market, we'll be discussing the impact of recent sanctions on Russia for bonds and currency markets. It's Friday, March 11th at 1:00 p.m. in London. 

Simon Waever: and 8:00 a.m. in New York. 

James Lord: So, Simon, we've all been watching the recent events in Ukraine, which are truly tragic, and I think we've all been very saddened by everything that's happened. And it certainly feels a bit trite to be talking about the market implications of everything. But at the same time, there are huge economic and financial consequences from this invasion, and it has big implications for the whole world. So today, I think it would be great if we can provide a little bit of clarity on the impact for emerging markets. Simon, I want to start with Russia itself. The strong sanctions put in place have really had a big impact and increasing the likelihood that Russia could default on its debt. Can you walk us through where we stand on that debate and what the implications are? 

Simon Waever: That's right, it's had a huge impact already. So Russia's sovereign ratings have been downgraded all the way to Triple C and below, which is only just above default, and that's them having been investment grade just two weeks ago. If you look at the dollar denominated sovereign bonds, they're trading at around 20 cents on the dollar or below. But I think it all makes sense. The economic resilience needed to support an investment grade rating goes away when you remove a large part of the effect reserves, have sanctions on 80% of the banking sector, and with the economy likely to enter into a bigger recession, higher oil prices help, but just not enough. For now, the question is whether upcoming payments on the sovereign dollar bonds will be made. And I think it really comes down to two things. One, whether Russia wants to make the payments, so what we tend to call the willingness. And two whether US sanctions allow it, so the ability. Clarifications from the US Treasury suggests that beyond May 25th, payments cannot be made. So, either a missed payment happens on the first bond repayment after this, which is May 27th or Russia may also decide not to pay as soon as the next payment, which is on March 16th. And of course, the reason for Russia potentially not paying would be that they would want to conserve their foreign exchange. And actually, we've already had some issues on the local currency government bonds, so the ones denominated in Russian ruble. James, do you want to go over what those issues have been? 

James Lord: That's absolutely right. Already, foreigners do not appear to have received interest payments on their holdings of local currency government bonds. There was one due at the beginning of March, and it looks as though, although the Russian government has paid the interest on that bond, the institutions that are then supposed to transfer the interest payments onto the funds of the various bondholders haven't done so for at least the foreign holders of that bond. Does that count as default? Well, I mean, on the one hand, the government can claim to have paid, but at the same time, some bondholders clearly haven't received any money. There's also another interest payment due in the last week of March, so we'll see if anything changes with that payment. But in the end, there isn't a huge amount that bondholders can really do about it, since these are local currency bonds and they're governed under local law. There isn't really much in the way of legal recourse, and there isn't really much insurance that investors can take out to protect themselves. The situation is a bit different for Russian government bonds that are denominated in US dollars, though. So I'd like to dig a little bit more into what happens if Russia defaults on those bonds. For listeners that are unfamiliar, investors will sometimes take out insurance policies called CDSs or credit default swaps just for this type of situation, and they've been quite a lot of headlines around this. So, Simon, I'd be curious if you could walk us through the implications of default there. 

Simon Waever: So it's like two different products, right? So you have the bonds there, it can take a long time to recover some of the lost value. I mean, either you actually get the economic recovery and there's no default or you then go to a debt restructuring or litigation. But then on the other hand, you have the CDS contracts, they're going to pay out within a few weeks of the missed bond payment. But it's not unusual to find disagreement on exactly what that payment will look like. And that payment is, we call it, the recovery value perhaps is a bit like the uncertainty that sometimes happens when standard insurance needs to pay out. But if we start with the facts, if there is a missed payment on any of the upcoming dollar or euro denominated bonds, then CDS will trigger. Local currency bonds do not count and the sovereign rating does not matter either. So far I think it's clear, the uncertainty has been around what bonds can actually be delivered into the contract, as that's what determines the recovery value. As it stands, sanctions do allow secondary trading of the bonds. There have been some issues around settlement, but hopefully that can be resolved by the time an auction comes around. The main question is then where that recovery rate will end up, and I would say that given the amount of selling I think is yet to come I wouldn't be surprised if it ends up being among the lower recovery rates we've seen in E.M sovereign CDS. 

James Lord: Yeah, that makes sense on the recovery rates and the CDs. But I mean, clearly, if Russia defaults, there could be some big implications for the rest of emerging markets as well. And even if they don't default, I mean, there's been a lot of spill over into other asset classes and other emerging markets. How do you think about that? 

Simon Waever: So I try to think of it in two ways, and I would expect both to continue if we do not see a de-escalation in Ukraine. So first, it really impacts those countries physically close to Russia and Ukraine and those then with trade linkages, which mainly comes with agriculture, energy, tourism and remittances. And that points you towards Eastern Europe, Turkey and Egypt, for instance. Secondly, if we also then see this continued weaker risk backdrop, it would then impact those countries where investor positioning is heavier. But enough on sovereign credit, I wanted to cover currencies, too. The Russian central bank was sanctioned. What do you think that means for EM currencies? 

James Lord: Absolutely. The sanctions against the central Bank of Russia were really quite dramatic and have understandably had a very big impact on the Russian exchange rate. The ruble’s really depreciated in value quite significantly in the last couple of weeks. I mean, during periods of market uncertainty, the central Bank of Russia would ordinarily sell its foreign exchange assets to buy Ruble to keep the currency under control. But now that's not really possible. It's led to a whole range of countermeasures from Russia to try and protect the currency, such as lifting interest rates from just under 10% to 20%. There have also been significant restrictions on the ability of local residents to move capital abroad or buy dollars, and on the ability of foreigners that hold assets in Russia to actually sell and take their money home. All of that's designed to protect the exchange rate and keep foreign exchange reserves on home soil. I think the willingness of the US to go down that road, as well as the authorities in Europe and Canada and other jurisdictions, it does raise some important questions about whether or not investors will continue to want to hold dollars and US government bonds as part of their FX reserves. Many reserve asset holders may wonder whether or not similar action could be taken against them. This has become a big debate in the market. Some investors believe that this turn of events could ultimately lead to some long-term weakness in the dollar. But I think it's also important to remember that yes the U.S. is not the only country that has done this, and it's probably the case that actually any country could potentially freeze the foreign assets of another central bank. And if that's the case, then I don't see having a materially negative impact on the dollar over the long term, as many now seem to be suggesting. But I think that's all we have time for today. So let's leave it there. Simon, thanks very much for taking the time to talk. 

Simon Waever: Great speaking with you, James. 

James Lord: As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show. 

As inflation remains a focal point for the U.S. consumer, higher energy costs will dampen discretionary spending for some. But not all are impacted equally and there may be good news in this year’s tax refunds and the labor market.

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Ellen Zentner: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Ellen Zentner, Morgan Stanley's Chief U.S. Economist. 

Sarah Wolfe: And I'm Sarah Wolfe, also on Morgan Stanley's U.S. Economics Team. 

Ellen Zentner: And today on the podcast, we'll be discussing the outlook for the U.S. consumer during this year's tax season and after, as inflation remains in the driver's seat and new geopolitical realities raise further concerns. It's Thursday, March 10th, at 9:00 a.m. in New York. 

Sarah Wolfe: So, Ellen, I know you want to get into the U.S. consumer, but before we dig in, I think it would be useful to hear your view on the overall U.S. economy, especially given the new geopolitical challenges. 

Ellen Zentner: So, I think it's helpful to think about a rule of thumb for the effects of oil on overall GDP. For every 10% sustained increase in oil prices, it shaves off about one tenth on GDP growth. And so when we take into account the rise in energy prices that we've seen thus far, we took down our growth forecast for GDP this year by three tenths and shaved off an additional tenth when looking further out into 2023. Now, one thing that I think is important for the U.S. outlook versus European and U.K. colleagues is that energy prices are a much bigger factor in an economy like Europe's, and the U.K.'s where they're much more reliant on outside sources, where in the US we've become much more energy independent over the past decade. But I think where I step into your world, Sarah, as we think about higher oil prices, then translate into higher gasoline prices, which hits consumers in their pocketbook. So Sarah, that's a great segue to you on the U.S. consumer because this has been one of your focuses on the team. Consumers don't like higher prices. And, you know, we've been seeing this big divergence between sentiment and confidence. So why aren't those measures moving exactly hand in hand if inflation is the biggest concern there? 

Sarah Wolfe: Definitely. There's a lot of focus on consumer confidence, which comes from the Conference Board and consumer sentiment, which comes from University of Michigan. Both have been trending down, but there's been a record divergence between the two, where Conference Board is sitting about 48 points higher than sentiment. And inflation plays a huge role in this. So just getting down to the methodology of the surveys, the reason there's been such a divergence is because Conference Board places more of a focus on labor market conditions, whereas University of Michigan sentiment focuses more on inflation expectations. And so when you're in an environment like today, where the unemployment is very low, the labor market is very tight, that's very good for income that gets reflected through the confidence surveys. But at the same time, inflation is extremely high, which erodes real income, and that's getting reflected more in the sentiment survey. So, we are seeing this large divergence between the surveys and they're telling us different things, but I think both are very important to take into account. 

Ellen Zentner: So let me dig into inflation a little bit further then specifically and how it affects you when you're thinking about our consumer spending outlook. I mean, some of the changes that we've made to CPI forecast, you know, talk us through that and how you're building that into your estimates for the consumer. 

Sarah Wolfe: So we recently raised our headline forecast for CPI, or Consumer Price Index, inflation for the end of this year by 40 basis points to 4.4%. And we've also lowered our forecasts for real Personal Consumption Expenditure, or PCE, but only about 10 basis points this year to around 2.8%. And the reason that it's not a one for one pass through is, first of all, we're tracking the first quarter spending so much higher than what we had expected, so overall, even though higher gasoline prices will likely hit spending a bit more in the second quarter of 2022, we are already tracking this year much stronger. So on net, the impacts a bit smaller. Also, just because gasoline prices are going up doesn't mean that people spend less. Actually, overall, it tends to mean that people just increase their spending pool. So you have income constrained households at the lower end of the income spectrum, they're gonna pull back their spending on non-gasoline, non-utility expenditures, but on the other end, middle higher income households will just increase their spending pool, you know, gasoline prices go up so they’re just going to be spending a bit more. It doesn't necessarily mean that consumption is going to be lower. If anything, it could add more upside risk to consumer spending.

Ellen Zentner: You know, this is where economists can always sound a bit dispassionate because we oftentimes look at things in the aggregate and you've been writing about, how different income levels deal with higher gas prices. Talk about some of the work that you've put out with the retail teams that might be affected by that lower income consumer pulling back. 

Sarah Wolfe: Yeah. So just to start off with when we look at what this is going to cost households at higher gas prices, we estimate that on an annualized basis, it's going to cost households roughly $1600 dollars more on gasoline and utilities a year. So that's if higher prices that are where they are today last for the entire year. In terms of the hit by income group that could raise spending on energy by about 2% of disposable income for the highest income group, but by about 7% for the lowest income group, so that basically can equate to a 7% hit on non-gasoline and utility spending for lower income households. And so that feeds through mostly into discretionary spending for the lowest income group. And we did work with our retail teams describing this and talking about how very strong job growth and positive real wages are a tailwind for lower end consumers. But it's not enough to outpace the headwinds of stimulus rolling off on top of higher energy prices, which act as a tax to households. 

Ellen Zentner: Yeah, so it'll be a little bit more of a struggle for them until we get some alleviation from this price burden. I want to walk you through, though something else that we're in the midst of now. Tax refund season is upon us, and I think the refund season started a few weeks ago. And so, you track this on a weekly basis once those tax refunds start getting sent out, where are we tracking? 

Sarah Wolfe: Yeah, so you are right, refund season started in late January, and it's going to end in mid-April, so it's about a month earlier than last year. There's also a lot more going on with tax refunds because of all the COVID emergency programs. There's a lot more refund programs that lower middle income households could file for. You had the child tax credit, you have childcare refunds, elderly care refunds, so there was a lot of uncertainty on how refunds were going to come in this year. Through the week ending February 25th, the average refund size was roughly $3500 dollars per person, which is well above the average refund amount during the same week in previous years. So it's about $1500 higher than in 2020 and about $800 to $900 than 2019. So it's really quite significantly higher, and I think this is really important because when we talk about the low end consumer it could really provide this extra cushion that they need. We're already seeing in the auto sub-prime space and credit sub-prime space that delinquencies are starting to pick up. But I do think that this tax refund season could really help alleviate some of these pressures and bring delinquencies back down as more refunds get distributed. 

Ellen Zentner: So if I tie a bow around all of this, we still have a constructive outlook on the consumer. You've written about excess savings, you're now tracking the tax refund season, at the end of the day, right, you've talked about how the fundamentals drive the consumer and the fundamentals are income and strong labor market. We've got above average job gains, we've got above average wage growth, that creates this income proxy for the consumer that looks quite strong. So I think there's a lot more room to absorb the impact of higher prices today in the U.S. and especially when you compare it to some of our other major trading partners. So, Sarah, thanks for taking the time to talk. 

Sarah Wolfe: As always, it was great to speak with you, Ellen. 

Ellen Zentner: And thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share the podcast with a friend or colleague today.

With the rising cost of oil comes concerns around economic growth, but the distinction between the impact in Europe and the US is important, presenting both challenges and opportunities for investors.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Any references in this report to entities, debt or equity instruments, projects or persons that may be covered by such sanctions are strictly informational, and should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities, instruments or projects. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

-----Transcript-----

Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets.

It's Wednesday, March 9th at 1:00 PM in New York.

This week, the United States closed its markets to imports of Russian oil as another measure in its response to the invasion of Ukraine. In anticipation of this announcement, the price of oil increased to as high as $129 per barrel, leading the average gas price in the United States to reach $4.25. Understandably, this has created a new burden for consumers and also has investors concerned about the macroeconomic impacts of higher fuel prices. Here’s the latest thinking from our economists.

We expect the downside to economic growth to be felt more in Europe than the United States. Unlike the US, Europe is a net importer of energy, which means when fuel prices go up they have to pay the price but don’t earn the extra income from selling fuel at a higher price. Accordingly, our European economics team has revised down their expectations for GDP growth by nearly 1% for 2022. The impact in the US should be more muted, with our colleagues dropping their growth forecast by 30 basis points to 4.3%. Again, this is because the US enjoys substantial domestic energy production. So while higher prices at the pump might interfere with some consumer purchases, the income from those fuel purchases will drive consumption elsewhere in the economy.

But these views aside, we have to acknowledge these conditions of elevated fuel and commodities prices drive uncertainty around the future economic and monetary impacts that markets will consider. Increasingly, clients want to discuss and debate the idea of stagflation, which is the combination of slowing growth and rising inflation, in both the US and Europe. And that sentiment could persist for some time, as our commodities research team thinks swings in the price of oil between $100 and $150 are possible in the near term.  

We’ll have a lot more on that in future podcasts, but for now wanted to point out one tangible takeaway for investors: potential upside for equities in the energy exploration and production sector. Higher prices at the pump means potential for more revenue, yet the sector is valued at a discount to the S&P 500 when accounting for its prices relative to the cash flow of companies in that sector. 

Bottom line, the global economy is changing quickly, presenting both challenges and opportunities. We’ll be keeping you in the loop on both.

Thanks for listening! If you enjoy the show, please share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague, or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show.

As European markets price in slowing growth, increased inflation and geopolitical tensions, pricing power is a potential focus for European investors looking to weather the storm.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Graham Secker, Head of Morgan Stanley's European Equity Strategy Team. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the impacts of recent geopolitical developments on European markets and why rising stagflation pressures point towards owning companies with good pricing power. It's Tuesday, March the 8th at 1:00 pm in London.

Since our last podcast on European equities, the backdrop has changed considerably, with an escalation in geopolitical tensions putting upward pressure on inflation, downward pressure on growth and generally raising European risk premia as uncertainty spikes. Last week my colleague Jens Eisenschmidt, our Chief European Economist, cut his forecasts for European GDP growth for this year and next, while also raising his projections for inflation on the back of higher energy costs. While Jens is not predicting a European recession at this time, investors are becoming incrementally more worried about this possibility as geopolitical tensions extend and oil and gas prices continue to rise. 

Even if Europe does manage to avoid falling into an outright recession, the stagflationary conditions that are building in the region, namely slowing growth and rising inflation, have important implications for investors. Across the broader market it points to a more challenging backdrop for corporate profits as slowing top line momentum coincides with growing margin pressures from higher input costs. At the same time, heightened geopolitical uncertainty is putting downward pressure on equity valuations as investors rotate out of the region, thereby lowering the price to earnings ratio at the same time as profit expectations retrench. 

After a near 20% decline from their January highs, it's fair to say that European stocks are pricing in quite a lot of bad news here, with equity valuations now below long run averages and close to record lows vs. U.S. stocks. While we think this provides an attractive entry point for longer term investors, European markets will likely remain tricky in the short term as investor sentiment oscillates between hope and fear. Our experience suggests that markets rarely trough on valuation grounds alone, instead requiring a backdrop of broad capitulation, coupled with a more positive turn in the news flow - conditions that have not yet fallen into place. 

In many respects stagflation is the worst environment for asset allocators, as slow growth weighs on stocks at the same time as high inflation potentially undermines the case for bonds. Thankfully such an environment has been rare over the last 50 years, however we can still construct a ‘stagflation playbook’ for equity markets when it comes to picking stocks and sectors. Specifically, we identify prior periods when inflation was rising at the same time as growth indicators were falling. We then analyze performance trends over those periods. When we do this, we find that a stagflationary backdrop tends to favor commodity and defensive oriented stocks at the expense of cyclical and financial companies - a trend that has repeated itself over the last month here in Europe. 

An alternative strategy is to focus on companies that have strong pricing power, as they should have more ability to raise prices to offset higher input costs than other stocks. In a European context, sectors that are currently raising prices to expand their margins, even in the face of rising input costs, include airlines, brands, hotels, metals and mining companies, telecoms and tobacco. To be clear, not every stock in these sectors will enjoy superior pricing power, but we think these areas are a good place to start the search. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today. 

The year of the stock picker is in full swing as investors look towards a future of Fed tightening and geopolitical uncertainty, where some individual stocks will fare better than others.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday, March 7th at 11:00 a.m. in New York. So let's get after it. 

Since publishing our 2022 outlook in November, we've taken a more bearish view of stocks for reasons that are now more appreciated, if not fully. First was the Fed's pivot last fall, something most suggested would be a small nuisance that stocks would easily navigate. Part of this complacency was understandable due to the fact that the Fed had never really administered tough medicine in the past 20 years. Furthermore, when things got rough in the markets, they often pivoted back - the proverbial Fed “Put”, or the safety net for markets. We argued this time was different, just like we argued back in April 2020 that this quantitative easing program was different than the one that followed the Great Financial Crisis, or GFC. In short, printing money after the GFC didn't lead to the inflation many predicted, because it was simply filling the holes created on bank and consumer balance sheets that were left over from the housing collapse. However, this time the money printing was used to massively expand the balance sheets of consumers and businesses, who would then spend it. We called it helicopter money at the time. In short, the primary difference between the post GFC Fed money printing and the one that followed the COVID lockdown, is that the money actually made it into the real economy this time and drove demand well above supply. 

This imbalance is what triggered the Fed to pivot so aggressively on policy. In fact, Chair Powell has admitted that one of the Fed's miscalculations was thinking supply, including labor, would be able to adjust to the higher levels of demand making this inflation transitory. This has not been the case, and now the Fed must be resolute in its determination to reduce money supply growth. Nowhere was this resolve more clear than during Chair Powell's congressional testimony last week, when he was asked if he would be willing to take draconian steps, as Paul Volcker did in the early 1980s to fight inflation. Powell confidently answered, "Yes". To us this suggests the Fed "Put" on stocks is well below current levels, and investors should consider this when pricing risk assets. 

The other reason most investors and strategists have remained more bullish than us is due to the path of earnings. So far, this positive view has been correct. Earnings have come through, and it's the primary reason why the S&P 500 has held up better than the average stock. Therefore, the key question continues to be whether earnings growth can continue to offset the valuation compression that is now in full swing. We think it can for some individual stocks, which is why the title of our outlook was the year of the stock picker. As regular listeners know, we have been focused on factors like earnings, stability and operational efficiency when looking for stocks to own. Growth stocks might be able to do a little better as earnings take center stage from interest rates, but only if the valuations have come down far enough and they can really deliver on growth that meets the still high expectations. 

The bottom line is that the terribly unfortunate events in Ukraine make an already deteriorating situation worse. If we achieve some kind of cease fire or settlement that both Russia and the West can live with, equity markets are likely to rally sharply. We would use such rallies to lighten up on equity positions, however, especially those that are vulnerable to the earnings disappointment we were expecting before this conflict escalated. More specifically, that would be consumer discretionary stocks and the more cyclical parts of technology that are vulnerable to the payback in demand experienced over the past 18 months. Another area to be careful with now is energy, with crude oil now approaching levels of demand destruction. On the positive side, stick with more defensively oriented sectors like REITs, healthcare and consumer staples. 

Thanks for listening! If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show.

While the U.S. continues to see high valuations, rising inflation, and slow policy tightening, the story is quite different for many markets outside the U.S.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape and how we put those ideas together. It's Friday, March 4th at 3 p.m. in London. 

While Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has implications for financial markets, it has  bigger implications for people. Hundreds of thousands have already been displaced, numbers which are likely to grow in the coming weeks. These refugees deserve our compassion, and support. To those impacted by this tragedy, you have our sympathies. And to those helping them, our admiration.

Our expertise, however, is in financial markets, and so that’s where we’ll be focusing today. For those that are most negative on the market right now, the refrain is pretty simple and pretty straightforward. Assets are still expensive relative to historical valuations. Inflation is still high and it's still rising. And central banks are still behind the curve, so to speak, with lots of interest rate increases needed to bring monetary policy back in line with the broader economy. 

What I want to discuss today, however, was how different some of these concerns can look when you move beyond the United States. 

Let's start with the idea that assets are expensive. Now, this clearly applies to some markets, but less to others. Stocks in Germany, for example, trade at less than 12 times next year's earnings, Korean stocks trade at 10 times next year's earnings, Brazil, it's 8 times. And many currencies trade at historically low valuations relative to the U.S. dollar. 

Next up is inflation. While inflation is high in the U.S. and Europe, it's low in Asia, a region that does account for roughly 1/3 of the entire global economy. What do I mean by low? U.S. consumer prices have increased 7.5% Relative to a year ago. Consumer prices in China and Japan, in contrast, are up less than 1%. 

My colleague Chetan Ahya, Morgan Stanley's Chief Asia Economist, notes that these differences aren’t just some mathematical illusion, but rather reflect real differences in Asia's economy and policy response. 

Finally, there's the idea that central banks are behind the curve, so to speak. Now, the hindsight here is a little tricky, as the Federal Reserve and the ECB were dealing with enormous uncertainty around the scope of the pandemic for much of last year. But what's notable is that not all central banks took that path. Central banks in Chile, Brazil, Poland and Hungary, just to name a few, have been raising interest rates aggressively for the better part of the last 12 months. 

In times of crisis, markets often try to simplify the story. But the challenges facing global markets, from valuations, to inflation, to monetary policy, really are different. As events unfold, it will be important to keep these distinctions in mind.

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to Thoughts on the Market on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen, and leave us a review. We'd love to hear from you.

As the Fed continues to signal coming rate hikes this year, the housing market will face implications across home sales, mortgage rates, and fundamentals.

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Jay Bacow: Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Jay Bacow, Co-Head of U.S. Securitized Products Research here at Morgan Stanley. 

Jim Egan: And I'm Jim Egan, the other Co-Head of U.S. Securitized Products Research. 

Jay Bacow: And on this edition of the podcast, we'll be talking about changes in the Fed policy and what the possible implications are for mortgages and the housing market more broadly. It's Thursday, March 3rd at 11:00 a.m. in New York. 

Jim Egan: Okay, Jay, we've talked about affordability pressures as mortgage rates have moved higher a couple of other times in the past on this podcast, and we would encourage listeners to go back and listen to those prior podcasts for a deeper dive on affordability. But Jay Powell just testified this week that he'll support a 25 basis point hike in March. Furthermore, if inflation pressures are persistent, then he's gonna raise Fed funds by more than 25 basis points at later meetings. The markets priced in six hikes this year. What does that mean for mortgage rates going forward? When I think about affordability, am I gonna have to think of another 150 basis point increase in mortgage rates? 

Jay Bacow: No. So you saying the market has priced in six hikes is really important, because mortgage rates are based on generally sort of the belly of the Treasury curve. And the belly of the Treasury curve is effectively a function of what the market's expecting the Fed to do, along with how much risk premium there is. And if the market's expecting the Fed to hike six times this year, then if the Fed hikes six times this year and there's no change in risk premium, then mortgage rates aren't really going to move very much from where they are right now. Now, Powell said that he's worried about inflation and so if inflation comes in higher than expected or the market changes their demand for risk premium, then mortgage rates are gonna move. 

Jay Bacow: But Jim, mortgage rates have already moved a lot, they've gone up 100 basis points this year in just two months. What does this mean for affordability? 

Jim Egan: From the affordability perspective, it's a problem. But that also really depends on how we define what a problem is. The housing market's been doing very, very well. But when we think about this kind of move in mortgage rates, existing home sales, transaction volumes, they're going to have to fall. 

Jay Bacow: But haven't existing home sales gone up a lot already? 

Jim Egan: Yes, and that's where we think it's important to really look at historical experiences during times like this. If we look back to mortgage rates to 1990 we have five other instances of this kind of increase in mortgage rates. Now, one of those was during the housing crisis, so we're going to remove the experience there, but if I look at the other four instances existing home sales climbed very sharply during that first 6 month period, while mortgage rates were climbing by 100 basis points. That's where we are right now, we're seeing that climb. The 12 months after, the subsequent year, which we're going to start to enter March of this year going forward, that's where existing home sales tend to plateau and in a lot of instances come down. And they tend to come down further if mortgage rates continue to climb during that year, which is what we just discussed. So we think it's very likely, and if historical precedent holds, then we've already seen the peak of existing home sales for at least the next 12 months. 

Jay Bacow: What about home prices? Powell was asked if he thinks that home prices are going to fall and go back to pre-COVID levels, and he said he thought that raising mortgage rates would just slow down home prices, and he doesn't want to see home prices fall. What do we think? 

Jim Egan: Well, I'd like to believe he's reading our research because that's very much in line with how we think about things right now. We think that home price appreciation at a 19% rate right now is going to have to slow. And as we've said on this podcast before, affordability pressures are really one of, if not the key reason that the rate of HPA has to come down. Simply put, potential homebuyers cannot continue to afford to buy homes, at prices that would allow HPA to continue to climb at almost 20% year over year levels. However, if we think about the other factors that would come into play to bring home prices from a positive level to a negative level, we just do not see those characteristics in the market right now. Supply conditions are very constrained. We think they'll be alleviated somewhat this year, but that's not enough for there to be an overhang of supply that would weigh on home prices. We think that the credit availability in the market has been very conservative. We don't think we're at a risk of increased defaults and foreclosures. What we think happens is that transaction volumes fall, as we've stated, as home buyers aren't willing to pay the prices that home sellers want to sell at. But those sellers are not forced. And so you end up with a market that kind of doesn't trade, home price growth slows and we see it bottoming out kind of in a positive 5-6% percent range from here. So, long story short, we agree with that assessment from Jay Powell. 

Jim Egan: Now, the other side of the equation, mortgages. With rates backing up by that much, Jay, what do we think about the mortgage market here? 

Jay Bacow: So rates backing up means that there's going to be less people refinancing. And you said that there's going to be a slowdown in existing home sales as well. But, we're still worried about the supply to the agency mortgage market. And that's because the supply that we care about the most is the new supply coming from new home sales. And the thing about new home sales is that it's about an 8-month period from the time that the homebuilder gets the permit to start building the house, to when it actually gets sold. So we're going to have about 6 more months of supply from people that started to build their house when mortgage rates were a lot lower. And that's going to weigh on the market, particularly given that Powell said during his testimony that they're going to start balance sheet normalization in the coming months. So, we've got supply coming and we've got the biggest buyer stepping away from the market. Now, mortgage rates have gone up and mortgage spreads have widened, but we think there's a little bit more room for mortgages to underperform given the supply that's coming, and the lack of demand coming from the Fed. 

Jim Egan: Certainly interesting times. Jay, thanks for taking the time to talk today. 

Jay Bacow: Always great speaking with you, Jim. 

Jim Egan: As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show. 

The recent crisis in Ukraine has caused a great deal of uncertainty in the economy and markets. To cut through the noise, we take a look at the three key questions we are hearing from investors.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Any references in this report to entities, debt or equity instruments, projects or persons that may be covered by such sanctions are strictly informational, and should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities, instruments or projects. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

-----Transcript-----

Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bring you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets. It's Wednesday, March 2nd at 3pm in New York. 

As an analyst focusing on the interaction between geopolitical events and financial markets, I'm accustomed to dealing with uncertainties evolving at a rapid pace. But even by those standards, nothing in my career compares to the events of the past two weeks: the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the sanctions response by the US, the UK and Europe. To help cut through the noise, here's answers to the three most frequently asked questions by our investor clients. 

First, do sanctions mean higher energy costs? In the short term, the answer is likely yes. While sanctions on Russian banks currently permit payments for various energy commodities, there's still restrictions on, and disruptions to, their transportation. With Russia being a key producer of several commodities, including 10% of the world's oil, it's not surprising that global oil inventories have declined and the price of a barrel of oil is sitting above $100. 

This dovetails with the second question. Should we expect the Fed will shy away from hiking rates? In short, we don't think so, at least at the Fed's March meeting, but it certainly creates substantial uncertainty in the outlook. This conflict seems to be affecting both parts of the Fed's dual mandate in opposite directions. It risks dampening economic growth, but for the reasons we just described, it can also boost inflation. Accounting for both, our economists still expect the Fed to hike 0.25% in March but the conflict adds another layer to an already unprecedented level of complexity for the Fed. This is actually the key point for fixed income markets, in our view, where investors should prepare for ongoing volatility in Treasury and credit markets as the Fed may have to regularly tinker with their own assessment of growth and inflation. 

Finally, what are the long-term implications for investors? To answer this question, we refer you back to our framework for 'Slowbalization,' or the idea that companies will have to, in certain industries, spend more to adjust supply chains and exit certain businesses as governments create policies that prioritize economic and national security over short term profits. You can see how this trend may already be accelerating after the onset of the Ukraine crisis, with several multinational companies announcing they'll sell stakes in, exit joint projects with or pause sales to Russian companies. But some equity sectors may see upside. Defense and software, for example, could see bigger spending as governments reorient their budgets towards these efforts, most notably Germany announcing it will boost its defense spending to 2% of GDP. 

Of course, the situation remains fluid, and we'll continue to track it and keep you in the loop on what it means for the economy and markets. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague, or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show. 

As the conflict between Russia and Ukraine continues to unfold, implications for the oil and gas sector in Europe are beginning to take shape.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Any references in this report to entities, debt or equity instruments, projects or persons that may be covered by such sanctions are strictly informational, and should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities, instruments or projects. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Martijn Rats, Global Commodity Strategist and Head of the European Energy Research Team for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a global perspective, I'll be talking about developments in the oil and gas sector amidst geopolitical tensions. It's Tuesday, March 1st at 2:00 p.m. in London. 

As the situation between Russia and the Ukraine continues to develop, implications for commodity markets are beginning to take shape. Russia is a major commodity producer, playing in an especially important role in providing energy for Europe through oil and natural gas imports. With a new round of sanctions announced over the weekend, the precise impact on prices remains to be seen, but we can begin to forecast the direction. 

First, there is no sign at this stage that, at least at the aggregate level, the flow of commodities has been impacted yet. All of the pipeline and tanker tracking data that we've seen suggests that they continue to be shipped. That shouldn't be too surprising, it's still early days and the sanctions that have been announced so far have been carefully crafted to reduce the impacts on energy flows from Russia. 

Second, trade patterns will nevertheless likely shift. We can already see this in the oil markets. European refiners are traditionally big buyers of Russian crudes, and even though technically they have continued to be able to buy these grades, they are increasingly reluctant to do so. There have been indications that ship owners are reluctant to send vessels to Russian ports, and that European buyers are uncertain about where sanctions will ultimately go. This is requiring increasingly large discounts. As many buyers already move away from Russian crudes, this also creates more demand for others, including North Sea crudes, which therefore drives up the price of Brent. 

Third, all of this is happening against the backdrop of tightness in both global oil markets and the European gas markets. We are seeing low and falling inventories, low and falling spare capacity and low levels of investment across both. At the same time, there is a healthy demand recovery ongoing as the world emerges from COVID. Given this tightness, even a modest disruption can have large price impacts. Now, with that in mind, risks to oil and gas prices are still firmly skewed higher, at least in the short term. 

Finally, I want to point at the growing tension in Europe between diversification and decarbonization. Several key politicians have said over the last several days that Europe should reduce its dependance on Russian oil and gas, and diversify its sources of supply. At the same time, Europe has set ambitious targets to decarbonize. Diversification requires investment in new supply, while decarbonization then requires that those supplies, in the end, will not be used. How that tension will be resolved is hard to know, but this is an issue that at some point will need to be addressed. 

Bottom line, there is still a lot of uncertainty for commodity markets in the coming weeks and months. We will keep you posted, of course, as new developments take shape. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share the podcast with a friend or colleague today. 

Like many markets, Corporate Credit has faced a rocky start to 2022. For investors, understanding the difference between default and duration risk will be key to positioning for the rest of the year.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I am Vishy Tirupattur, Global Director of Fixed Income Research. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about corporate credit markets against the background of policy tightening and heightened geopolitical tensions. It's Monday, February 28th at 10 a.m. in New York. 

It's been a rough start for the year for the markets. Central banks' hawkish shift towards removing policy accommodation, the significant flattening of yield curves that followed, rising geopolitical tensions, fading prospects for fiscal support, and growing concerns about stretched valuations have all combined to spawn jitters in financial markets. Corporate credit has been no exception. After two years of abundant inflows, the narrative has turned outflows from credit funds in conjunction with negative total returns. These outflows conjure up painful memories of 2018, the last time the credit markets had to deal with substantial policy tightening. 

Let us focus on the source - sharply higher interest rates and duration versus credit quality and default concerns. Consider leverage loans, floating rate instruments that have credit ratings comparable to high yield bonds which are fixed rate instruments. 

Since the beginning of the year, high yield bond spreads have widened almost three and half times more than leverage loan spreads. If you limit the comparison just to fixed rate bonds, the longer duration investment grade bonds have significantly underperformed the lower quality high yield bonds. Clearly, it is duration and not a fear of a spike in defaults that is at the heart of credit investor angst. 

My credit strategy colleagues, Srikanth Sankaran and Taylor Twamley, have analyzed the impact of rate hikes on interest coverage ratios for leveraged loan borrowers. This ratio is a measure of a company's ability to make interest payments on its debt, calculated by dividing company earnings by interest on debt expenses during a given year. The key takeaway from their work is this - What matters more for interest coverage is the point at which higher rates become a headwind for earnings growth. Loan interest coverage ratios have historically improved early in the hiking cycle as interest expenses are offset by growth in earnings. 

I draw comfort from the evidence that as long as earnings growth holds up and does not turn negative, corporate credit fundamentals measured in interest coverage ratios are positioned well enough to withstand our economists base case of six 25 basis point rate hikes in this year. 

While credit fundamentals look fine, valuations are not. Since the beginning of the year, we have seen spread widening, the pace of which has picked up in the last couple of weeks. So, we still prefer taking default risk over duration and spread risk. The risk to this view has increased in the last few weeks. Specifically, if central bank reaction to the heightened geopolitical risk is to control inflation at the expense of growth, lower quality credit may be more exposed. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

As markets react to the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, price moves for corn, wheat, oil and metals may mean new inflationary pressures for central banks to contend with in the coming months.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

This recording references actual or potential sanctions, which may prohibit U.S. persons from buying certain securities, making certain investments and/or engaging in other activities in or pertaining to Russia.

The content of this recording is for informational purposes and does not represent Morgan Stanley’s view as to whether or not any of the Persons, instruments or investments discussed are or will become subject to sanctions. Any references in this presentation to entities, debt or equity instruments that may be covered by such sanctions should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities or instruments. Audience members are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned entities and/or securities are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape, and how we put those ideas together. It's Friday, February 25th at 3 p.m. in London. 

Russia's invasion of Ukraine has grabbed the headlines. There are other commentators and podcasts that are far more knowledgeable and better placed to comment on that conflict. Rather than offer assessment on geopolitics, I want to try to address one small tangent of these developments- the potential impact on prices and inflation. 

Russia and Ukraine are both major commodity producers. Russia produces about 10% of the world's oil, and Russia and Ukraine together account for 1/3 of the world's wheat and 1/5 of the world's corn production, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. So, if one is wondering why the price of wheat is up about 18% since the end of January, look no further. 

These commodities are traded around the world, but specific exposure can be even more acute. Morgan Stanley analysts estimate that Russia supplies roughly 1/3 of Europe's natural gas, while analysis by the Financial Times estimates that Ukraine supplies roughly 1/3 of China's corn. 

There are also second order linkages. Russia produces about 40% of the world's palladium, a key component for catalytic converters, and about 6% of the world's aluminum. But because Russia also provides the energy for a good portion of Europe's aluminum production, the impact could be even larger on aluminum prices than Russia's market share would indicate. 

Central banks will need to look at these changing prices and weigh how much they should factor into their medium term inflation outlook, which ultimately determines their monetary policy. For now, we think three elements will guide central bank thinking, especially at the U.S. Federal Reserve. 

First, higher policy rates are still necessary, despite international developments, given how low interest rates in the U.S. and Europe still are relative to the health of these economies. Slowing demand, which is the point of interest rate hikes, is still important to contain medium term inflationary pressures. 

Second, these developments may reduce the odds of an aggressive start to central bank action. A few weeks ago, markets implied that the Fed would begin with a large .5% interest rate increase. Our economists did not think that was likely, and continue to believe that the Fed will hike by a smaller .25% at its March meeting. 

Third and finally, the duration and scale of these commodity price impacts are uncertain. Indeed, I haven't even mentioned the prospect of further sanctions or other interventions that could further impact commodity prices. In the view of my colleagues who forecast interest rates, that should mean higher risk premiums, and therefore higher interest rates on government bonds in the U.S. and Europe. 

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to Thoughts on the Market on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen, and leave us a review. We'd love to hear from you. 

Water scarcity brings unique challenges in the path to a more sustainable future. Solving for them will mean both risk and opportunity for governments, corporates, and investors.

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Jessica Alsford Obviously, everyone's minds today are rightly on news out of Europe. We will have an episode to cover this in the coming days, but today we are thinking more long term on sustainability. 

Jessica Alsford Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Jessica Alsford, Global Head of Sustainability Research at Morgan Stanley, 

Connor Lynagh And I'm Connor Lynagh, an equity analyst covering energy and industrials here at Morgan Stanley. 

Jessica Alsford And on this episode of the podcast, we'll be discussing one of the leading sustainability challenges of the near future, water scarcity, as well as potential solutions that are likely to emerge. It's Thursday, February, the 24th at 3 p.m. in London, 

Connor Lynagh and it's 10:00 am in New York. 

Connor Lynagh So Jess, we recently collaborated on the report, 'Changing Tides, Investing for Future Water Access.' Maybe the best place to start here is the big picture. Can you walk us through the demand picture and how challenges are expected to change in the industry? 

Jessica Alsford So the key issue really is that water is a critical but finite resource, and there's already huge inequality in access to water globally. So over the last century, we've seen water use rising about six fold, and yet there are still around 2 billion people without access to safely managed drinking water and around 3.6 billion without safely managed sanitation. Then add to this the fact that demand is likely to increase by around another 30% by 2050, about 70% of total demand comes from agriculture withdrawals, and clearly we need to increase the amount of food we're producing due to growing population, and there's also going to be incremental water needs from industry and municipalities. A third element to also think about is that this is all happening at the same time that climate change is going to alter the hydrological cycle. And so, this is going to increase the risk of floods in some areas and drought in others. Eight of the 10 largest economies actually have either the same or higher water risk scores than the global average. And so clearly what is already a challenge in terms of providing access to water is only going to become more complicated going forward. 

Connor Lynagh So Jess, water is pretty unique when you look at the different challenges that the sustainability community is facing. What do you think is particularly unique and noteworthy about the challenge we're facing here? 

Jessica Alsford So the three really big sustainability megatrends that we look at our climate, food and then water. They're all interrelated and they're all really tricky to solve for. But I think there are some unique characteristics about water that do add some complexities to it. First of all, it is finite. So, in theory, we can produce more food, but it's very difficult to make more water. In addition, it's incredibly difficult and costly to transport water around. So, if you think about energy and food, these can be moved over pretty large distances, but water is really a regionally specific commodity. And then the third element really is that water is underpriced if you compare to the actual cost of providing it. There aren't any free markets really to set prices according to supply and demand and because water is essential to life, it's really not straightforward when it comes to thinking about pricing. 

Jessica Alsford So Connor, from your perspective, covering some of the stocks exposed to the water theme, what are your thoughts on how water might be priced going forward? 

Connor Lynagh Yeah, I mean, I think you really hit on a lot of the big issues, which is that pricing is very heavily regulated relative to a lot of commodities out there. You know, a lot of utilities are not really able to cover their costs without subsidies from the government. And so, you know, I think as a base case, there does need to be an increase in pricing to solve for some of this shortfall that we see out there. But that has to be done delicately. We can't disadvantage members of society that are already struggling. And so, I think what we're going to need to see is some sort of market-based pricing, but in select instances. So, Australia already has a relatively well-developed water market. You're seeing some moves in that direction in California as well. But I think as a first step, I think there's going to be increased focus on larger industrial users paying more than their share and allowing consumers to have a relatively advantaged position on the cost structure. 

Jessica Alsford So pricing is clearly one issue, but we also need to see huge investment in global water infrastructure. What are your thoughts on how this develops over the next few years? 

Connor Lynagh It’s interesting if you look at a cross-section of countries globally, we tend to spend about 1% of GDP on our water resources. So, I think it's a fair starting point to say that water spending is going to grow in line with GDP. But, as we look at the world today and as you've covered previously, the spending is already not sufficient. It's probably hard to quantify exactly how much we, quote, 'should' spend. But I'll point out a couple of data points here. So globally, we spend about $300 billion per year on water capex. In order to get global water access to those that currently don't have it, this would cost an incremental $115 billion a year. And even in countries like the U.S., where our infrastructure is relatively well developed, we are currently facing a spending shortfall of about $40 billion per year. So, we do think this is going to need to rise significantly. 

Jessica Alsford So if we look at climate, for example, we have seen a really big step up in terms of regulation and policy support to really try to drive investment into green infrastructure. And so just picking up on that, for investors who are looking at this theme, where can capital be deployed to help solve this issue? 

Connor Lynagh I think that there's obviously just a major infrastructure investment need, but I think that absent major changes in policy, there's a few areas that we still think are relative areas of excess spending growth, if you will, within the sector. So, the first is emerging markets. As countries climb the wealth curve, we do think that their investment is going to increase significantly. I'd point to areas like India and China as areas of significant growth over the next few years. Wastewater management globally I really think that there is going to be increasing regulation and corporate-level focus on this. And then the final thing is applying digital technologies. So, as it stands right now, only about 70% of water globally is connected to a meter. So first and foremost, we need to get a better sense of how we're using our water, where we're using our water. But we can also use cellular technology, digital technologies to better monitor who's using this water in real time, and I think that's going to be a major area of investment, particularly in the US and Europe. 

Connor Lynagh So, Jess, obviously there's opportunities for companies that can offer solutions to the water industry, but water access is also a risk for many companies around the world. How should investors think about this? 

Jessica Alsford Absolutely. Energy and power generation are the most water intensive sectors. But actually, what's really critical with this theme is access to water on a local level. So actually, our analysis has shown that companies across a wide variety of sectors can really be impacted, whether that be datacenters, pharmaceuticals, apparel or beverages. One of the sectors most at risk is actually copper. So copper is a very water intensive commodity, and a lot of copper just happens to be mined in Chile, which is a country unfortunately already suffering from water scarcity. Now, desalination plants are becoming the norm in Chile as there are competing demands for water between copper mines and also the local population. If we look ahead, we actually think that demand for copper could increase by around 25% per annum. And this is due to the vital role that it's playing in the energy transition, whether it be for renewables or EVs, for example. And with this incremental demand for copper comes incremental demands for water. I'd also point to hydrogen, again, a key piece of the decarbonization puzzle. So, water is needed for hydrogen, whether for cooling, for gray or blue hydrogen, or for the electrolysis process with green hydrogen. And our analysis suggests that almost 60% of future hydrogen projects are located in countries with water stress. So again, this is going to require inventive solutions to ensure that there really is sufficient access to water for all users. 

Connor Lynagh Jess, thanks for taking the time to talk.

Jessica Alsford Great speaking with you too Connor. 

Jessica Alsford And as a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please do take a moment to rate and review on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show. 

While geopolitical tensions currently weigh on markets, investors should look to the fundamentals in order to anticipate the depth and duration of the ongoing correction.

Important note regarding economic sanctions. This research references country/ies which are generally the subject of comprehensive or selective sanctions programs administered or enforced by the U.S. Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (“OFAC”), the European Union and/or by other countries and multi-national bodies. Users of this report are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned country/ies are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Wednesday, February 23rd at 11 a.m. in New York. So let's get after it. 

This past week tensions around Russia/Ukraine dominated the headlines. When unpredictable events like this occur, it's easy to simply throw up one's arms and blame all price action on it. However, we're not so sure that's a good idea, particularly in the current environment of Fed tightening and slowing growth. 

From here, though, the depth and duration of the ongoing correction will be determined primarily by the magnitude of the slowdown in the first half of 2022. While the Russia/Ukraine situation obviously can make this slowdown even worse, ultimately, we think that preexisting fundamental risks we've been focused on for months will be the primary drivers, particularly as geopolitical concerns are now very much priced. 

While most economic and earnings forecasts do reflect the slowdown from last year's torrid pace, we think there's a growing risk of greater disappointment in both. We've staked our case primarily on slowing consumer demand as confidence remains low thanks to the generationally high inflation in just about everything the consumer needs and wants. Many investors we speak with remain more convinced the consumer will hold up better than the confidence surveys suggest. After all, high frequency data like retail sales and credit card data remain robust, while many consumer facing companies continue to indicate no slowdown in demand, at least not yet. However, most of our leading indicators suggest that the risk of consumer slowdown remains higher than normal. Secondarily, but perhaps just as importantly, is the fact that supply is now rising. While this will alleviate some of the supply shortages, it could also lead to a return of price discounting for many goods where inflationary pressures have been the greatest. That's potentially a problem for margins. It's also a risk to demand, in our view, if the improved supply reveals a much greater level of double ordering than what is currently anticipated. In short, the order books - i.e. the demand picture - may not be as robust as people believe. 

Overall, the technical picture is mixed also within U.S. equities. Rarely have we witnessed such weak breath and havoc under the surface when the S&P 500 is down less than 10%. In our experience, when such a divergence like this happens, it typically ends with the primary index catching down to the average stock. In short, this correction looks incomplete to us. Nevertheless, we also appreciate that equity markets are very oversold and sentiment is bearish even if positioning is not. With the Russia Ukraine situation now weighing heavily on equity markets, relief would likely lead to a tactical rally, but we acknowledge that uncertainty remains extremely high. 

The bottom line for us is that we really don't have a strong view on the Russia/Ukraine situation as it relates to the equity markets. However, we think a lot of bad news is priced at this point. Therefore, we would look to sell strength into the end of the month if markets rally on the geopolitical risk failing to escalate further. 

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show.

The challenges of inflation can be felt around the world, but understanding the regional differences is key to an effective 2022 for both central banks and investors.

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Andrew Sheets Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley Research.

Seth Carpenter And I'm Seth Carpenter, Morgan Stanley's Chief Global Economist.

Andrew Sheets And on part 2 of this special episode of Thoughts on the Market, we'll be continuing our discussion on central banks, inflation, and the outlook for markets. It's Tuesday, February 22nd at 1:00 p.m. in London.

Seth Carpenter And 8:00 a.m. in New York.

Andrew Sheets So Seth, you lay out the challenge that central banks face because they are being pulled in two directions. If they raise rates too quickly, the economy could slow too quickly. That means real people lose their jobs, real businesses have trouble getting loans. On the other hand, if they don't raise rates quickly enough, there's a risk that inflation would be higher and that has a real impact on the economy and people's lives. When it comes to, kind of, which side of caution to air on, how do you think central banks are thinking about that at the moment? And what would you be watching to indicate which side of that debate they're starting to come down on?

Seth Carpenter I think if we're looking at the developed market, central banks, the Fed, the ECB, the Bank of England right now, I think they have a high conviction that the current stance of policy is just too accommodative given the state of the real economy and where inflation is. So I think right now all of them believe they need to get going, that starting now is fine. That mindset I don't think though will last too terribly long because over time we will start to see some outright tightening. So for the Fed, where does that point change? I think once they start to run off their balance sheet, probably sometime around the middle of this year, they're going to start to get much more cautious, they're going to look at markets and say how much of this tightening is being transmitted first through financial markets and then to the economy. So they'll be looking at credit spreads, they'll be looking at risk markets to ask, are we getting some traction? We think, especially if we're right and a bunch of the inflation that we're seeing now is this frictional inflation, that comes down in the latter half of the year. We think that hiking cycle is going to slow down over time. And so much like the Bank of England's forecast based on market pricing, we think there's probably a bit too much that's baked into markets in terms of how much hiking they do. They start off reasonably swiftly, knowing that they were too far away, knowing that they were being very accommodative. But in the latter half of the year, the pace of tightening starts to slow down.

Andrew Sheets Seth, another question that I get quite a bit is at what point will market volatility cause the Fed or another central bank to change their policy? There's an idea in the market that if stocks drop or if credit spreads widen, or if there's higher volatility, then central banks would look at that and respond to that. From a central bank standpoint, how do you think central banks think about market volatility? And what are some important ways that you think investors either correctly or kind of incorrectly think about that reaction function?

Seth Carpenter I can say over the 15 years that I spent at the Fed drafting policy documents, briefing the committee on policy options, thinking about how markets are affecting the economy, I can tell you the following. The market tends to have an overdeveloped sense of how sensitive central banks are to equity market reactions in particular. Equity market changes are important, it can be a very high frequency signal that there is cause to investigate what's going on in the economy. But they give many, many, many false signals as well, and so I would say that a sharp drop in equity prices would be the sort of thing that would get the attention of central bankers but would not force their hand to make a change. Instead, there would be further investigation. In addition, the whole point of tightening monetary policy is to tighten financial conditions and thereby slow the economy. So, it is not a question of are we getting credit spread widening? Are we getting softer asset prices? The answer to that is that's part of the plan. I think the real question is how large is the move in asset prices and how quick is the move in asset prices? If we have a very orderly tightening of financial conditions that plays out over several months, I don't think that's the sort of thing that causes the central bank to reverse course. If instead, over the course of a month you get a very sharp and disruptive widening and spreads, I think that really does cause a substantial reconsideration of the plan.

Andrew Sheets So, Seth, I think it's fair to say one of the challenges of your job at Morgan Stanley is you only have the entire global economy to look after. This is an inflation story that does look similar in some ways around the world, but also looks different. Your global economics team has done some interesting research recently on Asia and how Asia, which is an enormous economy in its own right, is seeing quite different, you know, inflation dynamics and labor market dynamics. I was hoping you could touch a little bit on that and how the regional differences can actually be pretty significant.

Seth Carpenter Absolutely. And I think Asia is very much the counterpoint to what we've seen in the rest of the globe in terms of the inflationary process. So inflation in Asia has been quite subdued, and I think there's some very clear reasons for that. First, when we think about food and energy inflation in Asia, many of the countries there have much more direct government intervention in those markets, and that has been helping to keep those inflation rates low. Second, when it comes to core consumer spending, there's been a bigger lag in consumer spending recovery in a lot of Asian economies than there have been in the developed market economies, which I think reflects two issues. One, aggressive COVID response, and second, much less fiscal transfers to the household sector, that is in the United States and in some other countries really helped to support consumer spending, especially on goods. And finally, in many Asian economies, there's been a bit less in the way of supply chain disruptions for the local market. So there really has been a big difference. I'll go you one further, when we think about the central bank's response, not only do we have the large developed market economy central bank starting to hike, the PBOC is going in exactly the opposite direction. The Chinese economy slowed aggressively for reasons that we can get into on another podcast, but the PBOC has eased. So, it is very much a differential outlook for both inflation and central banking in Asia versus the rest of the world.

Seth Carpenter But I have to say, Andrew, let me turn it around to you because inflation is clearly the key story this year. The change in developed market, central banks towards hiking is huge this year. How is all of this debate affecting your views on strategy as it markets across assets across the globe?

Andrew Sheets So I think there are a couple of important elements that are driving the way we're thinking about markets. The first is one key output of higher inflation is higher interest rates, or certainly investor concern around higher interest rates, if we look at how the market has historically performed as interest rates go up, what really matters, maybe simplistically, is how good the economy is. If interest rates are going up, but the underlying economy is still ultimately solid and strong, a lot of assets end up doing OK. And so if I think about, you know, the base case that you and the Morgan Stanley Global Economic Team have laid out where we have some maybe growth softness in the first quarter of this year, but overall 2022 is a pretty solid year for growth. I think that still means that overall, markets can avoid some of the more negative scenarios that would otherwise come with higher rates. But the second issue here that I think is important, and I think this dovetails nicely with your discussion on Asia relative to say the U.S., is that the challenges around inflation and rate hikes also have a lot of global differences. The more expensive your market is, the higher your rate of inflation, the less your central bank has done to this point. Which describes the U.S. pretty accurately, it's a more expensive market, the inflation rate is higher, the Fed has not made its first rate hike yet. I think that's a market where there's more uncertainty and where my colleague Mike Wilson, our Chief U.S. Equity Strategist, is forecasting a more difficult year for returns. You know, in contrast, in Europe the valuations aren't as expensive, the inflation rate isn't as high. I actually think it's OK for investors to kind of have different views on the impact of inflation, different views for 2022, because these trends are very different globally. And I think we're going to see a market that has much more diverse performance, it's going to be less one direction, it's going to be less unified. And I think that's OK, I think that would reflect a global backdrop for inflation and monetary policy and valuations that is quite different depending on where you look.

Seth Carpenter Great. Well, you know, as the saying goes, forecasting is hard, especially about the future. But I have very high conviction in the following forecast: you and I are going to have a lot to talk about over the balance of this year. It's been great talking to you, Andrew.

Andrew Sheets It's been great talking to you, Seth. As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

Inflation has reached levels not seen in years, but there is an important distinction to be made between frictional and cyclical inflation, one that has big implications for central banks this year.

----- Transcript -----

Andrew Sheets Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley Research.

Seth Carpenter And I'm Seth Carpenter, Morgan Stanley's Chief Global Economist.

Andrew Sheets And on this episode of Thoughts on the Market, we'll be discussing inflation, central banks and the outlook for rate hikes ahead. It's Friday, February 18th at 1:00 p.m. in London

Seth Carpenter and 8:00 a.m. in New York.

Andrew Sheets So, Seth, it's safe to say there's focus on inflation at the moment in markets because we're seeing some of the highest inflation rates in 30 or 40 years. When we think about inflation, though, it's really two stories. There is inflation being driven by more temporary supply chain and COVID related disruptions. And then there is a different type of inflation, the more permanent stickier type of traditional inflation you get as the economy recovers and there's more demand than supply can meet. How important is this distinction at the moment and how do you see these two sides of inflation playing out?

Seth Carpenter Andrew, I think you've laid out that framework extraordinarily well, and I think the distinction between the two types of inflation is absolutely critical for central banks and for how the global economy is likely to evolve from here. My take is that for the US, for the Euro area, for the UK, most of the excess inflation that we're seeing is in fact, COVID-related and frictional. And so, what we can see in the data is that we have an easing now in supply chain disruptions. Supply chain disruptions are still at a very high level, but they're coming down and they're getting better. Similarly, in the US and to some degree in the UK, there have been some labor market frictions because of COVID that have meant that some of the services inflation has also been higher than it might be otherwise. I don't want to diminish completely the idea that there's some good old fashioned cyclical macroeconomic inflation there, because that's also very important. But I think the majority of it is in the frictional type of COVID-related inflation. The key reason why that matters is what has to get done to bring that inflation back down to central bank targets. If the majority of this excess inflation is standard macro cyclical inflation, central banks are going to have to engage in sufficiently tight policy to slow the economy to create slack and bring down inflation. Now, the estimates are always imprecise, but estimates in the United States for, say, the Phillips curve, and when I say the Phillips curve, I mean either the relationship between the unemployment rate and inflation or more generally, the relationship between where the economy is relative to its potential to produce and how much there's currently aggregate demand in the economy. If we have three percentage points of excess inflation that has to be dealt with by creating slack, you're probably going to have to either cause a recession or wait many, many years to gradually chip away things to bring it down over time. It's just too large of an amount of excess inflation if it is truly that standard macro cyclical inflation.

Andrew Sheets So, Seth, it's been a while since we've had to deal with rate hikes in the market. And as you just laid out, there are estimates of how much the Fed would have to raise interest rates to address inflation, these so-called Phillips Curve models and other models. But there's a lot of uncertainty around these things. How much uncertainty do you think there is around how rate hikes will act with inflation? And how do you think central banks think about that uncertainty?

Seth Carpenter So I would completely agree there's uncertainty right now, and I think there are at least two important chains in that transmission mechanism, the first one that we're just talking about is how much of the inflation is cyclical and as a result, how much is going to respond to a slower economy. But the main part that I think you're getting at is also how do rate hikes - or any sort of monetary policy tightening - how does that affect the real economy? How much does that slow the economy? And I think there, it's a very open question. What we know is that over the past several decades there has been a long run downward trend in real interest rates and nominal interest rates. As a result, there's going to be a real tension for central banks trying to find just that sweet spot. How much do you need to raise interest rates to slow the economy without raising it so much that you actually tip things over into a recession? I think it's going to be difficult. And central bankers justifiably then take things very cautiously. Take the Fed as a particular example, they're tightening with two policy tools right now. They are going to both start raising interest rates and they're going to let their balance sheet runoff. We saw in 2018 that that was a tricky proposition, initially that everything went smoothly but by the time we got into late 2018, risk markets cracked, the economy slowed. Part of that was because of monetary policy tightening, and we saw the Federal Reserve in fact reverse course with those rate hikes. So it's going to be a very delicate proposition for central banks globally.

Andrew Sheets So, Seth, you talked about some of the uncertainty central banks are dealing with, how do they calibrate the level of interest rates with the effect it's going to have on the economy and maybe how that's changed relative to history. And there's another question obviously around timing. If you take a step back and kind of think about those challenges that the Fed or the ECB or the Bank of England are facing. how much into the future are they trying to aim with the monetary policy decisions they make today?

Seth Carpenter We're really talking about at least a year between monetary policy tightening and the effect it's going to have on that fundamental cyclical type of inflation. As a result, central bankers have to do forecasts, central bankers do forecasts all the time. And part of the judgment then will get back to that uncertainty that I mentioned before. How much of this inflation is temporary/frictional, how much of it is underlying, truly cyclical inflation? If all of this inflation that we're seeing is truly underlying cyclical inflation, then not only are they behind the curve, they're not going to be able to have any material effect on inflation until the beginning of next year. That's a really important distinction.

Andrew Sheets Well, and I think, you know, I think your answers there Seth raise such an interesting question and debate that's going on in markets that the market believes that the Federal Reserve won't be able to raise interest rates for very long before they'll have to stop raising rates next year. But then you also mention that the impacts of the rate increases they'll make today may not be felt for some time. These are really interesting kind of pushes and pulls. And I'm wondering if you think back through different monetary policy cycles, do you think there's a good historical precedent to help guide investors as they think about what these central banks are about to start doing?

Seth Carpenter I do, I do. And as you are comparing what central bankers may do to how the market is pricing things, I think there's a very interesting set of observations to make here. First, the last Bank of England report, where they provide their forecasts for inflation predicated on current market pricing. Under those forecasts the bank put out, the market has priced in so many rate hikes that it would cause inflation to be too low and go below their target. That's a reflection of the Bank of England's judgment that maybe the market has too much tightening baked into the outlook. But to your specific question about a previous historical precedent, I would look for the 1990s in the United States. During the 1990s hiking cycle, or should I say, just over the whole of the 1990s because it wasn't just one hiking cycle and that for me is the key historical precedent to look for. We saw hikes start in the early 90s, was not at a consistent pace. There was a time where the hikes were bigger, they were smaller, then the hiking cycle paused for a while. We got a reversal, we got a pause, we got more rate hikes and then we got a pause again and it came back down. That sort of very reactive policy is exactly what I think we're going to be seeing this time around in the United States, in the U.K., in the developed market economies where we have high inflation and central bankers are trying to sort out how much of that inflation is cyclical, how much of it is temporary.

Andrew Sheets Thanks for listening. We’ll be back in your feed soon for part two of my conversation with Seth Carpenter on central banks, inflation, and the outlook for markets. As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

The ongoing situation around Ukraine has captivated headlines and investors alike. While the resolution remains unclear, we can begin to predict how markets would react to possible outcomes.

This presentation references actual or potential sanctions, which may prohibit U.S. persons from buying certain securities, making certain investments and/or engaging in other activities in or pertaining to Russia. The content of this presentation is for informational purposes and does not represent Morgan Stanley’s view as to whether or not any of the Persons, instruments or investments discussed are or will become subject to sanctions. Any references in this presentation to entities, debt or equity instruments that may be covered by such sanctions should not be read as recommending or advising as to any investment activities in relation to such entities or instruments. Audience members are solely responsible for ensuring that their investment activities in relation to any sanctioned entities and/or securities are carried out in compliance with applicable sanctions.

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Michael Zezas Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas Head of U.S. Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley.

Marina Zavolock And I'm Marina Zavalock, Head of Emerging Europe, Middle East, and Africa Equity Strategy at Morgan Stanley.

Michael Zezas And on this special edition of the podcast, we'll be discussing ongoing developments around Ukraine and how markets might react to various outcomes. It's Thursday, February 17th at 9:00 a.m. in New York.

Marina Zavolock And it's 2:00 p.m. in London.

Michael Zezas So, Marina, we've spent a lot of time in recent weeks tracking developments in the ongoing situation around Ukraine, on whose border Russia's amassed a substantial military presence and there are warnings of a potential invasion. This would be no small event, potentially the largest military action in Europe since World War Two, with great risk to many people. Recent news has all sides continuing to express hope for a diplomatic solution, and let's hope that can be achieved. But for this podcast, we want to focus narrowly on the market's impact because this situation has been a key driver of recent moves in many global markets. So, let's keep it simple to start, which markets are most vulnerable to a military confrontation and why?

Marina Zavolock So, of course, we see Ukrainian and Russian markets as most directly vulnerable. Ukraine is directly exposed from an economic perspective, and the Ukrainian market has more downside risks due to this direct fundamental exposure and the country's reliance on external financing as well. The risk for Russian markets are more related to sanctions, given the strong economic backdrop. There are various sanctions under discussion aimed firstly at deterring a Russian invasion of Ukraine. Should Russia invade, we would expect the U.S. and Europe to act quickly to impose new sanctions, both to impact Russia’s decision making and ability to sustain any invasion, while at the same time limiting the impact on global commodities and supply chains to the extent possible.

Marina Zavolock The situation is, of course, very fluid, as you described. Sanctions have not yet been finalized, but I'll mention three of the material sanctions that are reportedly under discussion. First, SDN list sanctions on a number of Russian banks and possibly other Russian companies. This would mean US persons would be prohibited from dealing with these companies, be it in business transactions or trading of securities. Second, Export controls restricting the export of technology products containing U.S. made components or software to Russia. Third, New sovereign debt sanctions on the secondary market – adding to the primary market sanctions already in place – this could mean exclusion from large fixed income indices in a worst case. Overall, from a Russian stock market perspective, we see the Russian banking sector as potentially most exposed, given a number of banks appear targeted by SDN list sanctions, and would also be affected meaningfully by any ban on U.S. technology.

Michael Zezas So those outcomes seem pretty substantial here in terms of their impact. So obviously the outcome of this confrontation matters quite a bit. How do you think the stock markets you're tracking are set up to react to various outcomes, whether it be de-escalation from here or some form of further escalation?

Marina Zavolock So to assess the risk reward for different Russian and Ukraine related assets and commodities, we published a framework earlier this year to outline these scenarios: de-escalation, limbo (where uncertainty persists), partial escalation, and material escalation. For Russian equities in particular, we use two key variables that investors tend to focus on: the market's implied cost of equity and dividend yield. On implied cost of equity, Russia currently trades at 19%, which is about in line with the peak seen around many prior escalation periods in geopolitics, such as during the 2018 probe into U.S. election interference. But it is below the 26% level reached following Crimea annexation in 2014. On dividend yield, Russia trades at extraordinary levels of 16% at current commodity prices. We've never seen such levels before for any major country, or Russia, historically.

Marina Zavolock So coming back to the scenarios. Using these two variables I outlined, analyzing historical geopolitical escalation periods for Russia, we see about 50% potential upside to Russian stocks in a de-escalation scenario and at least 30% downside in the event of material escalation. Russian equities are currently trading roughly in line with our 'limbo' scenario, meaning the market is assuming continued talks and uncertainty without a breakthrough agreement. It's also worth noting here that although Russian equities are down about 20% from their pre-geopolitical escalation highs in October, they have also recovered 20% from their recent lows. And at the lows, the Russian market was already pricing in a partial escalation in Ukraine.

Michael Zezas So those are some pretty substantial differences based on different outcomes. What are some of the signposts or signals that you're watching for that might tell us what direction we're headed in?

Marina Zavolock So for the de-escalation scenario to become evident, the key signpost we're watching for is a meaningful reduction in Russian troops on Ukraine's border. Earlier this week, Russia’s defense ministry announced that Russia would start a pullback of some ot its forces after completing military drills – we are watching whether troops are actually being withdrawn, and to what extent. The reason we're watching troop movements particularly closely is that when there was a related buildup of Russian troops on Ukraine's borders last spring, it was Russia's announcement of a meaningful troop removal and the subsequent move of troops that allowed the market to recover by about 40% over the following months.

Marina Zavolock As for the escalation scenarios, of course, a further buildup of troops, any movement of troops across the border, any breakdown of ongoing talks with the West, these are all key signposts we're watching. We're also watching both local and international key government official commentary and news flow, which cover the situation differently. I'd also note that for those that aren't following all of these signposts very closely, the Russian equities market is rapidly reacting to developments, we think a step ahead of global markets, which have only recently begun to react to these risks.

Michael Zezas And Marina, outside of Russian equities, are there other markets you're watching that could experience spillover effects?

Marina Zavolock From a broader perspective, Russia is a key global exporter of various commodities. It's not just the well-known oil and European gas, but Russia also produces 37% of the world's palladium, which is essential for global autos manufacturing. It's a meaningful producer of nickel, aluminum, and a dozen other commodities. Many of these commodities recently started to rally, pricing in some risk premium on the back of the rise in global focus on these geopolitical risks. Our European equity strategist, Graham Secker, also anticipates European equities may be vulnerable to mid-single digit underperformance versus global equities in the case of escalation. That said, as I mentioned before, we see a low probability of spillover to these markets from a fundamental perspective. So, the impact is likely to be short term and more market sentiment driven in the case of escalation.

Michael Zezas Alright so, even if we assume that perhaps the diplomatic solution takes hold. What are the risks that this could repeat itself again as an escalation and then de-escalation cycle? And what would that mean for your coverage universe?

Marina Zavolock Even in a de-escalation scenario, long-term geopolitical risk to Russia will remain. I don't think the market will price these risks out quickly, and we've had increases in geopolitical risk and then de-escalation many times before since the 2014 Crimea invasion, and even before that. Regular investors in Russian markets have grown accustomed to these geopolitical risks. And there have been, over recent years, windows when Russian equities can have material returns, followed by sell offs on the back of increases in geopolitical tensions and incremental sanctions. That said, from 2014 lows to the recent peak in Russian equities, the Russian Equities Index has outperformed emerging markets by about 13% per year and returned 15% total, including dividends, per year. This is on the back of many structural drivers, like a tripling in dividend payout ratios over this time. In fact, recently, the Russian stock market has seen record levels of buybacks, dividend levels, and retail inflows.

Michael Zezas Marina, thank you. This has been really insightful. Thank you for taking the time to talk.

Marina Zavolock Thank you, Michael.

Michael Zezas And thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please be sure to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

Original Release on February 2nd, 2022: The Federal Reserve continues to face a host of uncertainties, leading to volatility in the Treasuries market. This trend may lead some investors to reconsider the municipal bond market.

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Welcome the Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets. It's Wednesday, February 2nd at 10 a.m. in New York.

A couple weeks back, we focused on the tough job ahead for the Federal Reserve. It's grappling with an uncertain inflation outlook driven by unprecedented circumstances, including the trajectory of the pandemic, and the still unanswered questions about whether supply chain bottlenecks and swelling demand by U.S. consumers for goods over services have become a persistent economic challenge. Against that backdrop, it's understandable that keeping open the possibility of continued revisions to monetary policy is part of the Fed's strategy. Not surprisingly, that uncertainty has translated to volatility in the Treasury market and, as expected, some fresh opportunity for bond investors.

For that, we looked in the market for municipal bonds, which are issued by state and local governments, as well as nonprofits. Credit quality is good for munis as the combination of substantial COVID aid to municipal entities and a strong economic recovery have likely locked in credit stability for 2022. But until recently, the price of munis was quite rich, in part reflecting this credit outlook, an expectation of higher taxes that would improve the benefit of munis tax exempt coupon, and a recent track record of low market volatility. But the bond market's reaction to the Fed undermined that last pillar, resulting in muni mutual fund outflows and, as a result, a move lower in relative prices for muni versus other types of bonds.

While this adjustment in valuations doesn't exactly make munis cheap, for individuals in higher tax brackets, they're now looking more reasonably priced. And, as a general rule of thumb, when the fundamentals of an investment remain good, but prices adjust for purely technical reasons, that's a good signal to pay attention.

So what does this mean for investors? Well, that fed driven volatility isn't going away, so munis could certainly still underperform some more from here. But for a certain type of investor, we wouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. If you're in a higher tax bracket and need to replenish the fixed income portion of your portfolio, it could be time to curb your caution and start adding back some muni exposure.

Thanks for listening! If you enjoy the show, please share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague, or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show.

As the Fed grapples with new data from last week's Consumer Price Index report, markets are pricing a move away from the dovish policy of the past and investors should pay attention.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Tuesday, February 15th at 10 a.m. in New York. So let's get after it.

While there are many moving parts in any market environment, investors often become infatuated with one in particular. In our view, going into last Thursday's consumer price index report was one of those times. For the days leading into it every conversation with investors, traders, and the media obsessed over the report and whether markets were appropriately priced. For the inflation bulls the release did not disappoint, coming in significantly stronger than expected with the components of the report just as hot.

Immediately after its release, both short- and longer-term interest rates surged. Additional policy hawkishness was quickly priced too, as markets concluded the Fed was falling even further behind the curve. Market chatter of an emergency Fed meeting made the rounds, indicating the possibility of immediate cessation of quantitative easing or even an intra-meeting rate hike. By the end of the day on Thursday markets had priced in a 90% chance of a 50 basis point hike at the March meeting, and six to seven 25 basis points worth of hikes by the end of the year. Balance sheet runoff, or quantitative tightening, is also expected to begin by the middle of this year at the rate of $80 billion a month.

When we first started talking about ‘Fire and Ice’ last September, our view that the Fed would have to go faster than expected to fight the building inflationary pressure was met with quite a bit of skepticism, and for a good part of the fall markets disagreed too. Some of this was due to the fact that most investors in markets like to see the hard data before positioning for it. The other reason is likely due to how the Fed and other central banks have behaved since the financial crisis, with their dovish policy bias. Fast forward to today and the data is irrefutable. Doves are quickly going extinct, and it's become almost a competition as who can have the most hawkish forecasts at this point.

While we don't doubt the Fed and other central banks resolve to try and get inflation back under control, the market is now all in on the idea that they will do their job to fight inflation. However, we find ourselves a bit more skeptical that they will be able to get as much policy tightening done as is now expected and priced. Furthermore, when something is this obvious and consensus, it's usually time to start focusing on something else.

As noted in the past several weeks, we think the equity markets will now begin to focus on growth or the lack thereof. In short, one should begin to worry about the ‘ice,’ now that ‘fire’ is finally appreciated. One of the reasons we are skeptical of the Fed and other central banks will be able to deliver on the policy tightening now expected, is the fact that growth is already slowing. An unusual circumstance at the beginning of any monetary policy tightening cycle, particularly one that is so ambitious. Whether it's the pay back in demand, or the sharp decline in real personal disposable income, we think the rate of consumption is likely to disappoint expectations in the first half of 2022. Furthermore, this weaker consumption is arriving just as supply chains are finally loosening up, something that is likely to be aided by the end of Omicron and the labor shortages it has created in the transportation and logistics industries. In that regard, Friday's consumer confidence survey release looks to be the more important macro data point of the week, not the CPI.

Bottom line, this correction started six months ago with the sharp rise in inflation and the Fed's pivot to address it. It will likely end when growth expectations are reset to more realistic levels sometime this spring. Until then, remain defensively biased with equity allocations.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app, it helps more people to find the show.

As investors face the multitude of risks ahead, one may need to think like the Tiger and use the rotation towards value stocks, and away from growth, to leap over higher hurdle rates this year. 

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Jonathan Garner, Chief Asia and Emerging Market Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley Research. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about Asia and emerging market equities in the year ahead. It's Monday, February the 14th at 8:30 p.m. in Hong Kong.

Welcome to the Year of the Tiger from the Morgan Stanley team in Asia. Ferocious, brave, and intelligent, the tiger inspires us to navigate the multitude of risks which confront investors today. For us in Asia, we're at first sight on the sidelines of the action as expectations build for a sea-change this year in monetary policy in the US and Europe.

Indeed, we have a degree of sympathy with the argument that the different phase of the monetary and fiscal cycle in China, in essence a moderate easing, is a key reason to be more constructive on Asian markets performance this year in both absolute and relative terms.

However, divergent policy cycles are only part of the story. North Asia has already benefited substantially from the major shift towards good spending and away from services, which has been such a unique feature of the COVID driven recession and recovery. Now, as that starts to reverse, given the reopening trend in the US and Europe, we may see earnings growth in markets like Korea and Taiwan slow. Moreover, significant challenges in relation to COVID management still beset the region, most notably in Hong Kong, which is experiencing its largest surge in cases since the pandemic began.

A key call that Morgan Stanley's equity strategy team made three months ago, in our year ahead outlook, was that investors on a worldwide basis should rotate away from growth stocks. That is, stocks with high expected earnings growth and high valuations towards value stocks. That is those with lower valuations, more dividend yield support, and lower anticipated earnings growth, not least due to the fact that many businesses in the value style category tend to be more established than growth stocks.

This rotation has indeed taken place, as evidenced not just by Nasdaq's underperformance in the US, but also the underperformance of growth stocks in Asia and emerging markets. This has been reflected in indices like Kosdaq in Korea or the TSE Mothers Index in Japan. In fact, in Japan banks and insurers, stocks which investors have not focused on for a long time, are leading in performance in 2022. Whilst in China, bank stocks have been outperforming internet stocks for some time now.

For those of us who worked through the 1999 to 2002 cycle in global equities, things seem very familiar. History rhymes rather than repeats, but the catalyst for growth stock underperformance then, as now, was a sudden repricing of interest rate hike expectations with a shift higher in nominal and real interest rates. That higher hurdle rate depresses valuations for equities generally, but particularly for higher multiple growth stocks, further motivation for the rotation towards value stocks.

So. investors may need to start thinking like the tiger in order to leap over that hurdle and land safely on the other side.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

Headlines today are focused on US Consumer Price Inflation rising 7.5% versus 1 year ago. The question on the minds of consumers and investors alike is, where will it go from here?

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape and how we put those ideas together. It's Friday, February 11th at 2 p.m. in London.

This week for the ninth month in the last 10, U.S. consumer price inflation was higher than expected, rising 7.5% Versus a year ago. Investors are currently having a very lively discussion around where inflation is headed, but also how much it matters. And I wanted to share a few of our thoughts.

One important thing about these rising prices is they aren't all rising for the same reason. COVID related disruptions are still impacting the production of everything from meat to automobiles. And say, with fewer new cars being built that means the cost of used cars has risen almost 50%. Now cars aren't a large share of the so-called inflation basket, the collection of goods and services that is used to determine how much overall prices are rising or falling. But if a small share of something rises 50%, the overall number can still rise quite a bit.

Then there are rising prices that we see today, but where the story has been building for some time. The assumed cost of shelter, for example, should be linked to the price of housing. But due to how this data is measured, there can be some pretty significant lags.

Consider the following. From the start of 2017, so about five years ago, U.S. home prices have risen 50%. But the assumed rise in the cost of shelter, that goes into the inflation calculation, suggests that the cost of shelter has risen just 16% over that same period. As this gap closes and shelter costs catch up to where home prices already are, that will get reported as a lot of additional inflation, even if home prices have stopped rising.

Another part of this story is the narrative and the timing of it. Per a quick check of the headlines this morning, Thursday’s inflation data was the top story for The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times.

Yet, based on Morgan Stanley's current forecasts, U.S. inflation is actually peaking right about now. We think the direction of data matters enormously in terms of how it's interpreted because there's a very human tendency to extrapolate whichever direction it happens to be heading. Today, the rate of inflation's been heading up, creating fears that it will continue to move higher. But if we're right that inflation peaks in the next month or two, April or May could feel very different.

Unfortunately, we're not quite there yet. The inflation rate is still rising, creating uncertainty about what central banks will do and how they'll respond. That uncertainty is driving volatility and should warrant lower prices for things that are very central bank sensitive. We think yields for government bonds in the U.S., the U.K., and the Eurozone will continue to move higher, and that spreads on mortgages, sovereign bonds, and corporates can move modestly wider.

On the other hand, we feel better about assets that are less sensitive to this inflation uncertainty, including the less expensive stock markets outside the U.S. Stocks in the United Kingdom which my colleague Graham Secker, Morgan Stanley's Chief European Equity Strategist, discussed on this program recently are one such example.

Finally, keep in mind that the inflation debate could feel very different in just a month or two. If the inflation data peaks soon, as our economists expect, it could provide some relief as we look ahead to April or May.

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to Thoughts on the Market on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen, and leave us to review. We'd love to hear from you.

Original Release on January 25th, 2022: With inflation on the minds of consumers and the Fed reacting with a sharp turn towards tightening, 2022 may be a year for investors to focus on incorporating tax-efficient strategies into their portfolios. Morgan Stanley Wealth Management’s Chief Investment Officer Lisa Shalett and Chief Cross-Asset Strategist Andrew Sheets discuss.

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Andrew Sheets Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, chief cross asset strategist for Morgan Stanley Research.

Lisa Shalett And I'm Lisa Shalett, chief investment officer for Morgan Stanley Wealth Management.

Andrew Sheets And today on the podcast, we'll be discussing the importance of tax efficiency as a pillar of portfolio construction. It's Tuesday, January 25th at three p.m. in London.

Lisa Shalett And it's 10:00 a.m. here in New York.

Andrew Sheets Lisa, welcome back to the podcast! Now, as members of Morgan Stanley Wealth Management's Global Investment Committee, we both agree that the current portfolio construction backdrop is increasingly complicated and constrained. But tax considerations are also important, and this is something you and your team have written a lot on recently. So I'd really like to talk to you about both of these issues, both the challenges of portfolio construction and some of the unique considerations around tax that can really make a difference to the bottom line of investment returns. So Lisa, let's start with that current environment. Can you highlight why we believe that standard stock bond portfolios face a number of challenges going forward?

Lisa Shalett We've been through an extraordinary period over the last 13 years where both stocks and bonds have benefited profoundly from Federal Reserve policy, just to put it bluntly, and, you know, the direction of overall interest rates. And so, our observation has been that, you know, over the last 13 years, U.S. stocks have compounded at close to 15% per year, U.S. bonds have compounded at 9% per year. Both of those are well above long run averages. And so we're now at a point where both stocks and bonds are quite expensive. They are both correlated to each other, and they are both correlated to a large extent with Federal Reserve policy. And as we know, Federal Reserve policy by dint of what appears to be inflation that is not as transitory as the Fed originally thought is causing the Fed to have to accelerate their shift in policy. And I think, as we noted over the last three to six weeks, you know, the Fed's position has gone from, you know, we're going to taper and have three hikes to we're going to taper be done by March. We may have as many as four or five hikes and we're going to consider a balance sheet runoff. That's an awful lot for both stocks and bonds to digest at the same time, especially when they're correlated with one another.

Andrew Sheets And Lisa, you know, if I can just dive into this a little bit more, how do you think about portfolio diversification in that environment you just described, where both stocks and bonds seem increasingly linked to a single common factor, this this direction of Federal Reserve policy?

Lisa Shalett One of the things that we've been emphasizing is to take a step back and to recognize that diversification can happen beyond the simple passive betas of stocks and bonds, which we would, you know, typically represent by, you know, exposures to things like the S&P 500 or a Barclays aggregate. And so what we're saying is, within stocks, you've got to really make an effort to move away from the indexes to higher active managers who tend to take a diversified approach by sector, by style, by market cap. And within fixed income, you know, we're encouraging, clients to hire what we've described as non-core managers. These are managers who may have the ability to navigate the yield curve and navigate the credit environment by using, perhaps what are nontraditional type products. They may employ strategies that include things like preferred shares or covered call strategies, or own asset backed securities. These are all more esoteric instruments that that hiring a manager can give our clients sources of income. And last, you know, we're obviously thinking about generating income and diversification using real assets and alternatives as well.

Andrew Sheets And so, Lisa, one other thing you know, related to that portfolio construction challenge, I also just want to ask you about was how you think about inflation protection. I mean, obviously, I think a lot of investors are trying to achieve the highest return relative to the overall level of prices relative to inflation. You know, how do you think from a portfolio context, investors can try to add some inflation protection here in a smart, you know, intelligent way?

Lisa Shalett So you know what we've tried to say is let's take a step back and think about, you know, our forecast for, you know, whether inflation is going to accelerate from here or decelerate. And you know, I think our position has broadly been that that we do think we're probably at a rate of change turning point for inflation, that we're not headed for a 1970s style level of inflation and that, you know, current readings are probably, you know, closer to peak than not and that we're probably going to mean revert to something closer to the, you know, two and a half to three and a half percent range sooner rather than later. And so in the short term, you know, we've tried to take an approach that says, not only do you want to think about real assets, these are things like real estate, like commodities like gold, like energy infrastructure linked assets that have historically provided some protection to inflation but really go back to those tried and true quality oriented stocks where there is pricing power. Because, you know, 2.5-3.5% Inflation is the type of inflation environment where companies who do have very strong brands who do have very moored competitive positions tend to be able to navigate, you know, better than others and pass some of that the cost increases on to consumers.

Andrew Sheets So, Lisa, that takes me to the next thing I want to talk to you about. You know, investors also care about their return after the effects of tax, and the effects of tax can be quite complex and quite varied. So, you know, as you think about that challenge from a portfolio construction standpoint, why do you think it's critical that investors incorporate tax efficient investing strategies into their portfolios?

Lisa Shalett Well, look, you know, managing, tax and what we call tax drag is always important. And the reason is it's that invisible levy, if you will, on performance. Most of our clients are savvy enough to suss out, you know, the fees that they're paying and understand how the returns are, you know, gross returns are diluted by high fees. But what is less obvious is that some of the investment structures that clients routinely use-- things like mutual funds, things like limited partnership stakes-- very often in both public and private settings, are highly tax inefficient where, you know, taxable gain pass throughs are highly unpredictable, and clients tend to get hit with them. And so that's, you know, part of what we try to do year in, year out is be attentive to making sure that the clients are in tax efficient strategies. That having been said, what we also want to do is minimize tax drag over time. But in a year like 2022, where you know, we're potentially looking at low single digit or even negative returns for some of these asset classes, saving money in taxes can make the difference between, you know, an account that that is at a loss for the full year or at a gain. So there's work to be done. There's this unique window of opportunity right now in the beginning of 2022 to do it. And happily, we have, you know, some of these tools to speed the implementation of that type of an approach.

Andrew Sheets So Lisa, let's wrap this up with how investors can implement this advice with their investments. You know, what strategies could they consider? And I'm also just wondering, you know, if there's any way to just kind of put some numbers around, you know, what are kind of the upper limits of how much these kind of tax drags, you know, can have on performance?

Lisa Shalett Yeah. So that's a great question. So over time, through the studies that we've done, we believe that tax optimization in any given year can add, you know, somewhere between 200 and 300 full basis points to portfolio performance, literally by reducing that tax bill through intelligent tax loss harvesting, intelligent product selection, you know, choosing products that are more tax efficient, et cetera.

Andrew Sheets Well, Lisa, I think that's a great place to end it. Thanks for taking the time to talk. We hope to have you back soon.

Lisa Shalett Absolutely, Andrew. Happy New Year!

Andrew Sheets As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

Many investors are asking when Congress will withdraw its fiscal policy support. Our answer? It already has, and 2022 could be a year where fiscal policy becomes a non-factor in the economic outlook.

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Welcome the Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas as Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets. It's Wednesday, February 9th at 10 a.m. in New York.

As the Fed keeps signaling its intent to withdraw its extraordinary monetary support for the economy, a common question we're hearing is when will Congress do the same with fiscal policy support? Our answer is simple: it already has.

Now, we're usually getting this question from investors concerned that COVID relief aid is continuing to create inflation pressure in the economy. But the last tranche of aid was approved over a year ago, and direct aid to support households from that program have largely expired, including the child tax credit, supplemental unemployment benefits, and renter and mortgage protections.

But what about all those infrastructure and social spending plans President Biden proposed? Even here there's no sizable fiscal expansion in sight. The bipartisan infrastructure framework was mostly offset by new revenues. And on the Build Back Better plan, Senator Joe Manchin appears to have made deficit neutrality a condition for his support for it. So any legislative comeback for that plan likely won't result in more fiscal support for the economy.

For investors, this is a throwback to periods where fiscal policy was an afterthought. In many recent years, like 2018, 2020 and 2021, fiscal policy was a key variable to the U.S. economic outlook. This year, it looks like a non-factor. That syncs with our framework for forecasting U.S. fiscal policy outcomes, which currently points to the U.S. having moved from a phase of proactive fiscal expansion, to one of stability. That's because legislative decisions by Congress that expand the deficit are typically a function of motive and opportunity. The motive is strong when there's perceived political value to the short-term economic boost that comes with the deficit expansion. The opportunity is there when one party controls Congress and the White House. Both these conditions were met after the 2020 election, resulting in another round of substantial COVID aid. But with inflation on the rise and issue polls showing it's beginning to bother voters, that motive is waning. As a result, expect U.S. fiscal policy to remain neutral until an election or an economic downturn opens a path for it.

But while fiscal policy might not be a macro factor, it could still drive some sector outcomes. For example, a deficit neutral build back better plan could still feature a corporate minimum tax, creating headwinds for financials and telecom. But it could also include substantial spending on carbon reduction, potentially directing a lot of fresh capital to the clean tech sector. And of course, it's important to remember 2022 is an election year, so expect the fiscal conversation to evolve.

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Despite having been one of the worst performing stock markets over the last 5 years, the UK is seeing a dramatic turnaround reflected in the FTSE100 index. Investors may want to take a closer look.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Graham Secker, Head of Morgan Stanley's European Equity Strategy team. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about our positive view on U.K. equities and why we think the FTSE 100 offers a compelling opportunity here. It's Tuesday, February the 8th at 3 p.m. in London.

Having been one of the worst performing stock markets over the last five years, the UK has seen a dramatic turnaround in 2022, with the headline FTSE 100 index, which is the UK equivalent of the S&P 500, outperforming the S&P by around 8% or so, so far, and posting the second-best return of any major global stock market after the Hang Seng in Hong Kong. Looking forward, we think the reversal of fortunes for UK equities can continue for three reasons.

First, we think the Footsie 100 index offers a good blend of offense and defense. On the latter, we note the defensive sectors account for 37% of UK market capitalization, which is higher than any other major country or region. Reflecting this, the UK index has outperformed the wider European market two thirds of the time during periods when global equities are falling.

When it comes to offense, we know that the UK market is a key relative beneficiary of rising real bond yields, to the extent that a move up in US real yields to our target of minus 10 basis points by year end would imply UK stocks outperforming the rest of the European market by as much as 12% this year. The reason behind the UK's positive correlation to real yields is again down to its sector mix. As well as being quite defensive, the index also has a significant weight in value stocks, such as commodities and financials. These are sectors that tend to perform best when real yields are rising, and investors are becoming more valuation sensitive.

While the UK has always had something of a value bias, this relationship is currently even stronger than normal and this leads me to the second driver behind our positive view on the FTSE 100 here, namely that the index is cheap. So cheap, in fact, that you have to go back to the 1970s to find the last time UK equities were this undervalued versus their global peers. To provide some context to this narrative, the FTSE 100 is on a 12-month forward price to earnings ratio of 12.5 versus Europe on 15 times, and the S&P closer to 20 times. As well as a low PE, the UK also offers a healthy dividend yield of 3.6%, which is around twice that on offer from global indices.

The third and final support to our positive view on UK equities is that consensus earnings expectations are very low, thereby creating a backdrop for subsequent upgrades that should support price outperformance. For example, consensus forecasts less than 3% earnings growth over each of the next two years, which represents the lowest growth forecast in over 30 years. We think this is too pessimistic and note the consensus expectations for the equivalent Eurozone index are much closer to normal at around 8 percent. The most likely source of upgrade risk around UK earnings comes from our positive view on the oil price, given the energy stocks accounted for 25% of all UK profits last year. With our oil team expecting the Brant oil price to rise to $100 later this year, we see scope for material profit upgrades for individual oil stocks and the broader FTSE 100 index too.

One last point a positive view on the UK is primarily focused on the headline Large Cap FTSE 100 index. We are less constructive on UK mid-caps, as this part of the market is more expensive and hence gets less of a benefit from rising real yields. The more domestic nature of the mid-cap index also means it's more exposed to the growing pressure on UK households from rising energy bills, food prices, and tax increases. In contrast, the FTSE 100 is a very international index, with around 70% of revenues coming from outside the UK. This makes it less sensitive to domestic economic matters and also a beneficiary if we see any renewed weakness in the sterling currency. To conclude, we think international investors should take a closer look at the UK as we think there's a good chance it ends up being one of the best performing global stock markets in 2022.

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As we head towards the final weeks of winter, we are predicting a period of continued slow growth. As evidence we look not to our shadow but at earnings estimates and inventories.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleague bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday, February 7th at 11:30 a.m. in New York. So let's get after it.

In the United States, February 2nd is known as Groundhog Day. A 135-year-old tradition of taking a groundhog out of his cage to determine if he can see his shadow. In short, a sunny February 2nd means six more weeks of winter, while a cloudy day suggests an early spring. Well, last week the most famous groundhog, who lives in Pennsylvania, saw his shadow informing us to expect more cold weather for six more weeks.

While this tradition lives on, its track record is pretty spotty with a 50% hit rate. Flipping a coin sounds a lot easier. However, it does jive with our market forecast for at least six more weeks of winter, and ice, as growth slows further into the spring. Signs of weakness are starting to appear, and we think they go beyond Omicron. While we remain optimistic that this could be the final major wave of the pandemic, we're not so sure growth will rebound and accelerate as many others are suggesting.

First, fourth quarter earnings beat rates are back to 5%, which is the long-term average. However, this is well below the beat rates of 15-20% observed over the past 18 months, a period of over earning in our view. The key question now is whether we are going to return to normal, or will we experience a period of under earning first, or payback? We've long held the view that payback was coming in the first half of 2022 as the extraordinary fiscal stimulus faded, monetary policy tightened, and supply caught up with demand in many end markets. Over the past few weeks several leading companies that weren't supposed to see this payback have disappointed with weaker than expected guidance on earnings. These stocks sold off sharply, and we think there are likely more disappointments to come as consumption falls short of expectations. Consumer confidence remains very soft due to higher prices, with our recent proprietary surveys suggesting consumers are expecting to spend more on staples categories over the next six months, versus the last six months. Spending on durables, consumer electronics and travel/leisure is expected to decline for lower income cohorts in particular.

Second, inventories are now building fast and driving strong economic growth. However, the timing of this couldn't be worse if demand is fading more than expected. As noted in prior research, we think it could also reveal the high amounts of double ordering across many different industries. If that's correct, we are likely to see order cancelations, and that will only exacerbate the already weakening demand. In short, this supports a period of under-earning by companies as a mirror image to the past 18 months when inventories were lean and pricing power was rampant.

Of course, the good news is that this likely means inflation pressures will ebb as companies lose pricing power. Eventually, this will lead to a more sustainable situation for the consumer and the economy. However, we think this could take several quarters before it's finally reflected in either earnings growth forecasts, valuations, or both. What this means for the broader market is probably six more weeks of downward bias. We continue to target sub-4000 on the S&P 500 before we would get more interested in trying to call an end to this ongoing correction. In the meantime, favor a defensive positioning. We've taken a more defensive posture in our recommendation since publishing our year ahead outlook in mid-November. Since then, it's paid off, although it hasn't been consistent. With last week's modest rally in cyclicals relative to defensives, we think it's a good time to fade the former and by the latter, since we still feel confident in our forecast for slowing growth even if the groundhog's track record isn't great.

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For only the second time in the last decade, commodities outperformed equities in 2021. Looking ahead at 2022, what challenges and opportunities are on the horizon for this asset class?

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Andrew Sheets Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Morgan Stanley's Chief Cross Asset. Strategist.

Martijn Rats And I'm Martijn Rats, Morgan Stanley's Global Commodity Strategist.

Andrew Sheets And today in the podcast we'll be talking about tailwinds driving commodities broadly, as well as the path ahead for global energy markets. It's Friday, February 4th at 3p.m. in London. 

Andrew Sheets So, Martijn, there were a number of reasons why I wanted to talk to you today, but one of them was that, for only the second time in the last decade, commodities outperformed equities in 2021. There are a number of drivers behind this, and you and your team have done some good work recently talking about those drivers and how they might continue. But one of them has certainly been the focus on inflation, which has been a major investment topic at the end of last year and continues to be a major topic into this year. Why are commodities and the inflation debate so interlinked and why do you think they're important for commodity performance?

Martijn Rats Well, look, commodities tend to maintain their value in real terms. So when there is broad inflation, the cost of producing commodities tends to go up. And when that happens, then the price of commodities tends to follow that. So at the same time, if you have a rising inflation, then also ends up in having an impact on interest rates. Interest rates start to rise. That tends to be a headwind for a lot of financial assets. So when inflation expectations all of a sudden pick up, then then all of a sudden it weighs on the valuation of an awful lot of other things, whilst actually commodities are often somewhat insulated of that. There aren't that many sectors that that really benefit from inflation. So all of a sudden then from an investment perspective, investment demand for commodities goes up. The allocation to commodities is still small, and when you put those things together, that explains why in the past and again over the last 12, 18 months, commodities really come into their own in these periods where inflation expectations are picking up and are high, commodities tend to do well in those environments.

Andrew Sheets So another thing about commodities is that you can't ignore is that this is a really diverse set of things. You know, we're talking about everything from, you know, wheat, to coffee, to aluminum, to crude oil. So it's hard to generalize what's driving commodities as a whole, but something I think is quite interesting in your research is that one theme that actually strikes out across a lot of different commodities from aluminum to oil, is the energy transition, which is affecting both demand for certain commodities and the supply of certain commodities. Could you go into that in a little bit more detail how you see the energy transition impacting this space? You know, really over the next decade?

Martijn Rats Yeah, it broadly splits in two and there are a range of commodities for which the energy transition is basically demand positive. So if you look at a lot of renewable projects, you know, wind power or solar power or hydrogen projects, electric vehicles, all of those types of assets require tremendous demand amounts of, basically of metals, copper, lithium, cobalt, nickel, aluminum. In those areas, it simply demands positive. But then there are other areas where the energy transition creates a lot of uncertainty about the long-term outlook for demand. This is particularly true, of course, for the fossil fuels, for oil and gas. And what is currently going on is that the energy transition is starting to become such a red flag not to invest in new productive capacity in those areas, that it's that it's already weighing on capex, and that there is an element of it constraining the supply of those fossil fuels even before demand is materially impacted. And we're seeing that at play at the moment. Oil and gas demand continues to recover quite strongly coming out of COVID, and there are actually very little signs that demand for those fossil fuels is rolling over anytime soon. But the energy transition makes the demand outlook over the long run into the 2030s very uncertain. And the way that we read the market at the moment is that the demand uncertainty is already impacting investment now. If you don't invest for the 2030s, there's a certain amount of oil and gas you also don't have over the next couple of years. So whether it's through the supply side or through the demand side, our conclusion would be that on the whole the energy transition contributes to the tightness of commodity markets in a relatively broad sense.

Andrew Sheets So Martijn, drilling down a little bit further into the oil story. You know, you and your team have identified what you call a triple deficit in oil markets that would drive a triple digit oil price estimate. You and your team think oil could hit $100 a barrel this year. Now what is that triple deficit and what's driving it?

Martijn Rats The triple deficit refers to the idea or the expectation that three things will be low in the oil markets simultaneously, broadly around the middle of this year as we go into the second half. The first one is inventories, the second one is spare capacity, and a third one is investment levels. Already read last year we have seen very strong draws in global oil inventories. The oil market was under supplied by about two million barrels a day last year, which is historically very high. The way that we model supply demands, that rate of inventory draws that does slow down in 2022, but we end up with inventory draws nonetheless, and we will end 2022 on our balances with inventories that are still lower than at the end of last year. So, the first point low and falling levels of inventory. The second point relates to spare capacity. The world's spare capacity to produce oil in emergency situations when it's needed completely sits within OPEC. There is no spare capacity outside of OPEC now. OPEC is growing production this year, but they're not adding an awful lot of capacity. Our reading of the situation is that by the middle of the year OPEC's spare capacity, which at the moment stands probably somewhere around three and a half million barrels a day, will fall below two million barrels a day. And typically, when spare capacity falls to such low levels, it becomes supportive for prices. So that's the second of the triple deficit that we talk about, low and falling levels of spare capacity. And finally, there is investment. Investment has been on a sliding trend already since 2014, took an enormous nosedive in 2020, did not rebound in 2021, and is only modestly creeping higher this year. Investment levels relative to current consumption we would characterize as very low. And that is not changing anytime soon. So if you add these three things up low inventories, low spare capacity, low levels of investment, you're really looking at the oil market that is very tight. And ultimately, we think that that will support this $100 oil price forecast.

Andrew Sheets So Martijn, the last thing I want to ask you about was this question of geopolitical uncertainty. When I talked to investors, there are some who think that the only reason that the oil price has gone up a lot this year is because of increasing geopolitical tension. There are others who say, no, it's gone up mostly because of the supply and demand imbalance that you just highlighted how do you how do you as a commodities analyst in your team try to address questions of how much of a driver is fundamental and how much of it is risk premium around event uncertainty?

Martijn Rats It depends a little bit market by market, but in most markets we have price indicators other than simply the spot price of the commodity that will tell us something about the underlying dynamics of the market. In particular, price forward curves tell us a lot, and particularly the slope of the forward curve tells us a lot. So if a market is fundamentally tight, quite often that is associated with downward sloping forward curves. Downward sloping forward curves, incentivize holders of inventory to release commodities from inventory, and the market only creates those structures when extra supply from inventory is needed. So at the moment, particularly in the oil markets, that is exactly that what we're seeing. We're seeing very steeply downward sloping forward curves. And that would be consistent with a scenario in which oil prices simply rise because of the tightness in supply demand, not because of speculative reasons. If you have purely speculative reasons, geopolitical risk building, the price can still rise, but the forward curve would not be so steeply downward sloping. And for that reason, we would be of the school of thought that actually says that particularly the rise in the price of oil recently is not related to geopolitical risk at this stage. Maybe at some point that will become more important, but that is not what's going on. So far, the price of oil is mostly supported by simply the fundamentals of supply and demand.

Martijn Rats That's typically how we go about it, but Andrew perhaps let me ask you. We look at commodities from a pure fundamentals perspective, supply and demand, inventories, those factors, but you often put it in a broader cross asset context. From a cross asset perspective, how do you look at the asset class?

Andrew Sheets So there are two factors here that I think are really important. The first is that I think commodities are really unique in that they are maybe the asset class where buying the index, kind of quote unquote, has actually potentially the most problematic. Some of the broadest, most widely recognized commodity indices have not performed particularly well over time, and some of that's due to the nature of the commodity markets you just highlighted. These markets can be inefficient, they can have structural inefficiencies. That's one thing I think investors should keep in mind is that the performance of commodities relative to some of the indices one might see can be quite different. The second element is around the inflation debate. I think that's really important. As we've discussed on this program before, I'm kind of skeptical that gold will be a particularly good inflation hedge in this environment. Whereas I'm a lot more optimistic that oil can work in that manner that energy related commodities can and I think there are some interesting dynamics there related not just to the to your team's fundamental views, your team has a much more bullish forecast for oil than it does for gold, as well as some of the more quantitative tools that we run that that oil yields a lot more to hold it than gold does, that oil has much better momentum, price momentum, than gold does. And generally speaking, in commodities, investors have been rewarded for going with the momentum. It tends to be a very cycle-based trending asset class. So, you know, I think that the case for commodities overall is strong in our cross asset allocation. We're running a modest overweight to commodities. That was a view we went out with in our 2022 outlook back in November. But you know, these nuances are really important, both between different commodities and then how one implements them going forward.

Andrew Sheets So with that, Martijn, thanks for taking the time to talk.

Martijn Rats My pleasure. Thank you, Andrew.

Andrew Sheets And thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share the podcast with a friend or colleague today.

Yields on Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities, or TIPS, are set to rise but, beyond inflation, what other factors will drive moves in real yields for these bonds in the coming year?

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Matthew Hornbach, Global Head of Macro Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about global macro trends and how investors can interpret these trends for rates and currency markets. It's Thursday, February 3rd at noon in New York.

Last week, I talked about our expectation for the yields on Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities to keep rising. Those bonds are known as TIPS, and their yields are called real yields. Today, I want to tell you about what I think moves real yields up and down, and how the current macro environment influences our view on their next move.

First, let's suppose demand for TIPS increases because investors think inflation is going to rise. If nothing else changes in the market, then TIPS prices will rise and the real yields they offer will fall. But, more often than not, something else changes.

For example, the monetary policies of the Federal Reserve. An important part of the Fed's mandate is to stabilize prices. The Fed has defined this to be an average inflation rate of 2% over time.

So, when inflation is above 2% and on the rise, like today, the Fed's approach to monetary policy becomes more hawkish. That means the Fed is looking to tighten monetary conditions and, more broadly, financial conditions. This tends to put upward pressure on real yields. So, even if inflation is high and rising, the effect of a hawkish Fed tends to dominate.

But what if inflation is rising from a rate below 2%? In this case, the Fed might favor a more dovish policy stance because it wants to encourage inflation to return to its goal from below. Therefore, we would expect downward pressure on real yields.

Another important factor driving inflation is aggregate demand in the economy. When investors expect demand to strengthen, that puts upward pressure on real yields. Said differently, when economic activity accelerates and real GDP is set to grow more quickly, real yields tend to rise.

The opposite also holds true. If investors expect a deceleration in economic activity or, in the worst case, a recession, then real yields tend to fall.

But what do these relationships mean for the direction of real yields in 2022? Bottom line, our economists expect the Fed to be more hawkish this year, tightening monetary policy in light of improved economic growth. Both of these factors should push real yields higher, even as inflation eventually cools later this year.

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The Federal Reserve continues to face a host of uncertainties, leading to volatility in the Treasuries market. This trend may lead some investors to reconsider the municipal bond market.

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Welcome the Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets. It's Wednesday, February 2nd at 10 a.m. in New York.

A couple weeks back, we focused on the tough job ahead for the Federal Reserve. It's grappling with an uncertain inflation outlook driven by unprecedented circumstances, including the trajectory of the pandemic, and the still unanswered questions about whether supply chain bottlenecks and swelling demand by U.S. consumers for goods over services have become a persistent economic challenge. Against that backdrop, it's understandable that keeping open the possibility of continued revisions to monetary policy is part of the Fed's strategy. Not surprisingly, that uncertainty has translated to volatility in the Treasury market and, as expected, some fresh opportunity for bond investors.

For that, we looked in the market for municipal bonds, which are issued by state and local governments, as well as nonprofits. Credit quality is good for munis as the combination of substantial COVID aid to municipal entities and a strong economic recovery have likely locked in credit stability for 2022. But until recently, the price of munis was quite rich, in part reflecting this credit outlook, an expectation of higher taxes that would improve the benefit of munis tax exempt coupon, and a recent track record of low market volatility. But the bond market's reaction to the Fed undermined that last pillar, resulting in muni mutual fund outflows and, as a result, a move lower in relative prices for muni versus other types of bonds.

While this adjustment in valuations doesn't exactly make munis cheap, for individuals in higher tax brackets, they're now looking more reasonably priced. And, as a general rule of thumb, when the fundamentals of an investment remain good, but prices adjust for purely technical reasons, that's a good signal to pay attention.

So what does this mean for investors? Well, that fed driven volatility isn't going away, so munis could certainly still underperform some more from here. But for a certain type of investor, we wouldn't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. If you're in a higher tax bracket and need to replenish the fixed income portion of your portfolio, it could be time to curb your caution and start adding back some muni exposure.

Thanks for listening! If you enjoy the show, please share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague, or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show.

The European Central Bank has indicated it would not raise rates this year, but markets are not fully convinced as shifts in inflation, gas prices and labor could force the ECB to reconsider.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I am Reza Moghadam, Morgan Stanley's chief economic adviser. Along with my colleagues, we bring you a variety of market perspectives. Today I'll be talking about the European Central Bank and whether it is likely to follow the Federal Reserve and the Bank of England in raising interest rates this year. It is Tuesday, February 1st at 2:00 p.m. in London.

The European Central Bank, or the ECB, has long said it would not raise interest rates until it has concluded its bond purchase program. Since the ECB only recently announced that its taper would take at least till the end of this year to complete, this in theory rules out rate increases in 2022. The ECB president, Madame Lagarde, has reiterated that rate increases this year are "highly unlikely."

However, the market is not fully convinced and is pricing some modest rate hikes. Many investors are also concerned that inflation could prove higher and more persistent than the ECB is projecting and could force it to follow the Fed and the Bank of England in tightening policy.

We should start by recognizing that euro area inflation is nowhere near as high as in the United States, and expectations of longer-term inflation are below 2% - unlike in the US. Labor market conditions are easier, with low and stable wage growth.

But even if the case for tightening is not as clear cut, this does not preclude a preemptive move by the ECB. Whether it does so will hinge on the continued viability of the ECB's inflation projections, which see inflation falling below its 2% target by the end of the year.

It is too early to conclude that this inflation path has become too optimistic. Certainly, the second-round effects of recent high inflation outcomes - on wages and long-term inflation expectations - has so far been moderate.

But this could change, and we would keep an eye on three triggers that might force a reconsideration.

First, long-term inflation expectations. If perceptions start to drift up in the face of chronic supply shortages and higher gas prices, the process risks becoming a self-fulfilling prophecy, and un-anchoring inflation expectations. The ECB will want to nip this in the bud.

Second, gas prices have jumped in the face of supply shortages and geopolitical tensions in Ukraine. Normally, the ECB looks through energy prices - not only because they are usually temporary, but also because, even when permanent, they imply a higher price level - not permanently higher inflation. But evidence of energy prices finding their way into long term inflation expectations could force action.

Third, the current benign labor market situation could tighten. In that case, the ECB would want to react before the process goes too far.

So if the ECB decides to tighten policy, what would that look like, and when could we expect it? A faster taper is the most likely vehicle for tightening monetary policy. Still, if inflation proves more resilient than currently projected, rate hikes while tapering cannot be definitively ruled out.

We see limited risk of a policy shift at the ECB meeting later this week. There could be some action in March, but we expect this to be more likely in June, when there will be a fresh forecast and some hard data to base decisions on. So stay tuned.

Thank you for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show.

Investing strategies can be categorized into two broad categories: subjective and systematic. While some prefer one over the other, the best outcomes are realized when they are used together.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, chief cross-asset strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape and how we put those ideas together. It's Monday, January 31st at 2:00 p.m. in London.

There are as many different approaches to investing as there are investors. These can generally be divided into two camps. In one, which I'll call ‘subjective,’ the investor ultimately uses their own judgment and expertise to decide what inputs to look at, and what those inputs mean.

Reasonable people often disagree, what variables matter and what they're telling us, which is why at this very moment you can find plenty of very smart, very experienced investors in complete disagreement over practically any investment debate you can think of.

A lot of the research that myself and my colleagues at Morgan Stanley do fall into this more subjective camp. We're constantly in the process of trying to decide which variables matter and what we think these mean. But there's another approach which I'll call ‘systematic.’ Systematic investing is about writing down very strict rules and then following them over and over again, no matter what, with no leeway. Think of it a bit like computer code, if A happens - I will do B.

The advantage of this systematic approach is that it isn't swayed by fear, or greed, or any other weaknesses in human psychology. The drawbacks are that very strict rules may not be flexible enough to adjust for genuine changes in the economy, in markets, or large, unforeseen shocks like a global pandemic. Think about it this way: Autopilot has been a great technological innovation in commercial aviation, but we all still feel much better knowing that there is a human at the controls that can take over if needed.

I mention all this because alongside our normal subjective research, we also run a systematic approach called our Cross Assets Systematic Trading Strategy, or CAST. CAST looks at what data has historically been most meaningful to market returns, and then makes rule-based recommendations on where that data sits today.

For example, if the key to investing in commodities historically has been favoring those with lower valuations, higher yields, and stronger recent price performance, CAST will look at current commodities and favor those with lower valuations, higher yields, and stronger recent price performance. And it will dislike commodities with the opposite characteristics. CAST then applies this thinking across lots of different asset classes and lots of different characteristics of those asset classes. It looks at equities, currencies, interest rates, credit and, of course, commodities.

At the moment there are a number of areas where our systematic approach CAST and are more subjective strategy work, are in agreement. Both approaches see US assets underperforming those in the rest of the world. Both expect European stocks to outperform European bonds to a large degree. Both see higher energy prices, and both see underperformance in mortgages and investment grade credit spreads.

When thinking about systematic versus subjective investment strategy, there's no right answer. But like our pilot analogy, we think things can work best when human and automated approaches can complement each other and work with each other.

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to Thoughts on the Market on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen and leave us a review. We'd love to hear from you.

Consumer prices reached an all-time high this past December, and a new year brings new challenges across inflation, wage growth and interest rates.

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Ellen Zentner Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Ellen Zentner, Chief U.S. Economist for Morgan Stanley Research.

Sarah Wolfe And I'm Sarah Wolfe, also on Morgan Stanley's U.S. Economics team.

Ellen Zentner And on this episode of the podcast, we'll be talking about the outlook for consumer spending in the face of inflation, Omicron, rising interest rates and other headwinds. It's Friday, January 28th at 10:00 a.m. in New York.

Ellen Zentner So Sarah, as most listeners have observed since the Fall, inflation is on everyone's mind, with consumer prices reaching a 39-year high in December, and we're forecasting inflation to recede throughout this year from about 7% now down to 2.9% by the fourth quarter. But let's talk about right now.

Ellen Zentner So, you've got your finger on the pulse of the consumer. You're a consumer specialist on the team. And so, I want to ask, how quickly have consumers adjusted their spending over the past few months because of inflation? What evidence have we seen?

Sarah Wolfe The consumer buying power has been very resilient in the face of high inflation. This week we got the fourth quarter GDP data and we saw the real PCE expanded by 3.3%. So that is another very strong quarter for consumer spending. And that brings spending to nearly 8% year over year in 2021, so very elevated. However, we are beginning to see that consumers may be reaching the upper echelon of their price tolerance in December. We got the retail sales report a couple of weeks ago for December, and we saw a very large contraction in consumer spending declined by more than 3%, and the decline was pretty broad based across all categories that have seen very high inflation, and this is largely reflective of goods spending. So, this is a pretty clear signal to us that while Omicron may be weighing on spending, inflation is largely at play here. And we still expect inflation to be peaking in January and February, so we likely will see some deterioration in consumer spending as we enter the first quarter of 2022.

Ellen Zentner How weak could consumer spending be this quarter?

Sarah Wolfe Right now, we just started our tracking for the first quarter of 2022 at 1.5% GDP growth, but within that, we have 1-2% contraction in real PCE. I will note that inflation's high so nominal PCE is still tracking positive, but it's not looking very good as we enter the first quarter.

Ellen Zentner Yeah, it seems clear that inflation is taking a bite. And remind me, we have this great consumer pulse survey that we've been putting out, and I think it was back in November, right? That the people were actually saying, "Look, I'm more worried about inflation than Omicron or than COVID 19". And that's incredible. I mean, that's a pandemic that's been weighing on people's minds and yet inflation usurped.

Sarah Wolfe We're also seeing it in the consumer sentiment surveys. The University of Michigan surveys inflation expectations each month. Near term inflation expectations have reached all-time highs. They're at 4.9%, and we're starting to see longer term expectations also start to tick up. In January, they hit 3.1%, which is a high since 2011. So, it's definitely being felt by consumers and causing a lot of uncertainty among them as well.

Ellen Zentner But now, because we have this forecast that inflation is going to peak in February, which is data we have in hand in March, if we're right on that, can that give us a lot of confidence that at least households can see that there's light at the end of the tunnel and start to breathe a sigh of relief?

Sarah Wolfe Yeah. As you mentioned, there are few headwinds facing the consumer right now. We think most of them are going to recede by the end of the first quarter.

Ellen Zentner Another big change for the consumer versus last year, that you've been writing about is the roll off of government stimulus for a lot of Americans. That had really helped bolster consumer spending, getting us to that big growth rate in 2021 that you mentioned. But now that that's rolling off, what impact might it have on spending this year?

Sarah Wolfe So, the big impact to spending is going to be felt this quarter in the beginning of 2022. And that's for two reasons. The first is that the child tax credits have come to an end. That did not get extended because the Build Back Better plan was not passed in time. and the child tax credits were boosting income for lower, middle-income households by $15B a month. And that included $300-360 payments per child per month. A lot of that was going straight into spending, food, other essential items, school supplies. So, we're going to get a level shift down in income and spending in January alone just because of the expiration. So, the other reason that first quarter is going to be hard for consumers is because a lot of the stimulus came through one year ago in 1Q21. That's when we got the $600 checks per person, then the $1400 checks and then also the supplemental $300 unemployment insurance benefit. So, when you're looking at income and spending year over year, especially for lower middle-income households, this is going to be a tough quarter.

Ellen Zentner All right. So that's a lot of stimulus that came in, not just over 2020, but all the way into early 2021. So, does that mean that they spent all of that money that they got? Because you've been writing a lot about this idea of an excess savings. So, what do you mean by that? How do we define excess savings? Who's holding that excess savings, and can it make its way into the economy?

Sarah Wolfe So, to define what excess savings is, it's basically cumulative savings above the pre-COVID savings trend. And how does that compare to the savings rate? The savings rate is just a monthly snapshot of income and spending, but excess savings is looking at how much is building up over time. And so excess savings, as many have heard this number, was over $2T throughout 2020 and 2021. We have data that shows that some of it was held all the way across the income distribution, but 80% of that was held among the top 20%. And so, a lot of that excess savings is still sitting with the wealthiest people.

Sarah Wolfe What about the excess savings for lower income people? It's a smaller dollar amount, and for that reason, it just does not go as far. We have been dealing with, I mentioned, with six to eight months of high inflation. We've seen consumer spending throughout all of this high inflation. And part of that was likely driven by the drawdown in excess savings for lower income households. And so, when I think about spending for 2022, excess savings is not the main driver.

Ellen Zentner So in this battle that households have with inflation, right? You got excess savings. There's a lot of uncertainty around how and when that might filter into the economy. And so, it seems that in the face of higher inflation then it makes labor income all that much more important. So, when you're looking at income or prices, how do you weigh that tug of war?

Sarah Wolfe So it's OK if prices are going up as long as wages are going up by more. And so, people continue to spend. What we're seeing in the data right now is that, on net, real wages are negative. I mean, we're dealing with 7% inflation. However, and this is very important, real wages for the lowest income group are actually positive. They're the group that's seen the strongest wage growth and it actually is outpacing inflation. I say this is really important because of all we have discussed. The rolling off of fiscal stimulus - this is a group that gets hurt the most by that. Inflation - this is also the group that gets hurt the most by that. When we think about the spending bucket of lower middle-income households, most of their spending goes to essential items like food, energy and shelter. Energy prices alone have increased by over 8% in the last three months.

Sarah Wolfe So, seeing real wage growth is very important, and we expect real wages to enter a positive territory for middle- and higher-income households as well as we enter mid 2022, and inflation comes down to about 4% or so.

Ellen Zentner Yeah, so for those of you not able to see us, Sarah rolls her eyeballs when she says "come down to 4%" because that's still such a high rate of inflation. But it is quite a few percentage points lower than where we've peaked. So, it's really about the direction. Households can start to breathe a sigh of relief that indeed this is not some sort of permanently higher inflation and ultimately just that labor market improvement, remains the most important piece of the consumer spending outlook. Would you agree?

Sarah Wolfe I would agree. Fundamentally, income is what drives spending and a large chunk of income is labor compensation. So as long as we're seeing job gains and wage growth outpacing inflation, we should continue to see spending as we move through a tough first quarter.

Ellen Zentner But importantly, we've got to be right on those inflation forecasts. You know, finally, let me just say a couple of things about the Fed's meeting here. So, we do believe that the Fed has laid the groundwork to start raising rates in March, and so higher interest rates are meant to slow activity and specifically through the credit channel, right? They're going to raise the cost of access to credit this year. But in terms of, sort of what contributes most to, say, downturns when the Fed is tightening is the interest expense on the household balance sheet, right? All that debt we carry, which is a tremendous amount, that interest expense rises. So, should we be worried about household balance sheets in this environment because the Fed is going to be raising rates?

Sarah Wolfe Yeah, I mean, households are carrying over $14T in debt, but things are not as bad as they sound. 70% of household debt is in mortgages and another 10% is in auto debt. And luckily, those are largely locked in at fixed rates. 90% of mortgages are at fixed rates, so that alone is 68% of the household balance sheet.

Sarah Wolfe So, the picture looks better on net for households. Obviously, you need to be a homeowner for it to be in that fixed rate. So, there are non-homeowners that are more susceptible to changing rates. So, people that are holding more credit card debt, that's more lower income people. So that is the group that's going to be the most affected by a raising rates environment.

Ellen Zentner Right. Good point. And so, it's even more important that we keep the labor market strong and wage growth strong for those lower income cohorts.

Ellen Zentner So we've talked a lot about the consumer, Sarah, but I could do this all day long. So, thanks for taking the time today.

Sarah Wolfe It was great talking with you, Ellen. Thanks for having me on.

Ellen Zentner And thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

Despite two good years for Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities, or TIPS, a dramatic rise in real yields may be cause for investors to reexamine their potential for 2022.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Matthew Hornbach, Global Head of Macro Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about global macro trends and how investors can interpret these trends for rates and currency markets. It's Thursday, January 27th at noon in New York.

Today, I want to talk about the Treasury market, and I want to get real. Yields on Treasury notes and bonds have risen dramatically to start the year, but real yields have risen more. What are "real yields"? Let me start by assuring you that yields on regular Treasury notes and bonds aren't fake. They are very real, but not in the same way as yields on Treasury inflation-protected securities.

Those inflation-protected bonds, known as TIPS, offer investors an inflation-adjusted yield. You can think about an inflation-adjusted yield as having two parts. The first part is a yield without an inflation adjustment. That's what we call the real yield. And the second part is a yield that adjusts for inflation. So, if the rate of inflation is positive, you get more than just the real yield.

Last year, a lot of investors bought TIPS because inflation was high and rising. The news media covered the topic of inflation like never before in my career. So, buying a security that offered inflation protection would have made sense last year. Consumer prices rose 7% over the year, and the TIPS index returned almost 6%. So that investment strategy worked out.

But, did you know that TIPS returned almost 11% in 2020, when consumer prices only rose 1.4%? That's right. TIPS were a much better investment in 2020, when there was less inflation than there was in 2021. How could that be?

Well, remember the real yield that TIPS offer investors? That yield can be a very important contributor to the total return of TIPS. And, at times, it can be even more important than the yield that adjusts for inflation.

Over the past couple of years, the real yields that TIPS have offered investors have been negative. So, imagine if there hadn't been any inflation over these past two years. An investment in TIPS might have been a bad one because investors would have been left with nothing but a negative yielding bond.

Of course, the yield on a bond is just one factor in driving the total return that investors receive. The other is capital gain - or loss. And the change in yields over time drive capital gains or losses. If bond yields fall, bond prices rise and that improves total returns. But if bond yields rise, well, falling prices hurt total returns.

And the same applies to the real yield on TIPS. Rising real yields hurts the total return of TIPS and can do so even during periods of high inflation, like today. The period since last Thanksgiving is a perfect example: inflation continued to surprise to the upside, but the real yield on 10-year maturity TIPS rose by over half a percentage point. As a result, TIPS delivered a negative total return of 3.5% during this period.

This should be a valuable lesson for TIPS investors. TIPS aren't just about inflation protection, although they do offer more inflation protection than most other bonds. TIPS perform best when inflation is high and rising, and real yields are stable or they're falling. We saw that environment in 2020 and through most of 2021.

But things have started to change. We expect real yields to keep rising this year and our economists expect inflation to fall. That means investors should get less yield that adjusts for inflation while having to cope with capital losses from rising real yields. It would be the worst combination for TIPS performance and stand in quite a contrast to the past two years.

So our advice is to stop thinking about TIPS as just protecting against inflation. Instead, investors should think about how TIPS performance could be impacted by higher real yields. And as the Fed raises interest rates this year, real yields should rise and hurt the performance of TIPS.

Thanks for listening. And if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

2022 is likely to bring fresh challenges for the U.S.-China dynamic. Investors can expect an increase in non-tariff barriers and continued commitment to re- and near-shoring of supply chains in the US.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets. It's Wednesday, January 26th at 10:00 a.m. in New York.

While the ongoing situation between the Ukraine and Russia remains an obvious geopolitical risk to pay attention to, we shouldn't lose sight of the ongoing developments in the relationship between the U.S. and China. There's plenty of reason to expect that, in 2022, the two countries’ economic relationship - perhaps the most consequential in the world - will face fresh challenges.

From the US's perspective, there's unfinished business. For example, the 'phase one' trade deal, signed back in January of 2020, expired at the end of 2021, and the results fell short of the agreement. Per data from the Peterson Institute, China only purchased 62% of the manufactured products, 76% of the agricultural products and 47% of the energy products it had committed to. These stats likely won't change the perception of the American voter, where issue polls show a bipartisan consensus that the U.S. relationship with China continues to be a problematic one. And since 2022 is a midterm election year, don't expect U.S. policymakers to stand pat on the issue.

So what can we expect? We've covered before how the U.S. has, and likely will continue, to raise non-tariff barriers with China - things like export controls around sensitive technologies and investment restrictions. These deployments will continue to make for a more challenging environment for U.S. companies seeking easy access to China's markets, either to sell or produce goods.

But one thing you can also expect is fresh legislative action to invest in the US's capabilities in key industries and supply chains that have been declared essential for economic and national security purposes. For example, news broke this week that the U.S. House of Representatives was starting its work to advance the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, or USICA. The bill passed the Senate last year with substantial bipartisan support and would spend over $200B on research in artificial intelligence, quantum computing and biotechnology, in addition to cultivating local supply chain sources for key tech needs, like rare earths.

This dynamic underscores a trend we've been focused on for many years. The slow but steady re and near shoring of supply chains for U.S. companies. It's a key reason our colleagues in equity research continue to see an opportunity in the capital goods sector, calling for a 'generational capex cycle over the next several years, driven by supply chain investment'.

So stay tuned. We'll keep tracking this trend and keep you informed.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show.

With inflation on the minds of consumers and the Fed reacting with a sharp turn towards tightening, 2022 may be a year for investors to focus on incorporating tax-efficient strategies into their portfolios. Morgan Stanley Wealth Management’s Chief Investment Officer Lisa Shalett and Chief Cross-Asset Strategist Andrew Sheets discuss.

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Andrew Sheets Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, chief cross asset strategist for Morgan Stanley Research.

Lisa Shalett And I'm Lisa Shalett, chief investment officer for Morgan Stanley Wealth Management.

Andrew Sheets And today on the podcast, we'll be discussing the importance of tax efficiency as a pillar of portfolio construction. It's Tuesday, January 25th at three p.m. in London.

Lisa Shalett And it's 10:00 a.m. here in New York.

Andrew Sheets Lisa, welcome back to the podcast! Now, as members of Morgan Stanley Wealth Management's Global Investment Committee, we both agree that the current portfolio construction backdrop is increasingly complicated and constrained. But tax considerations are also important, and this is something you and your team have written a lot on recently. So I'd really like to talk to you about both of these issues, both the challenges of portfolio construction and some of the unique considerations around tax that can really make a difference to the bottom line of investment returns. So Lisa, let's start with that current environment. Can you highlight why we believe that standard stock bond portfolios face a number of challenges going forward?

Lisa Shalett We've been through an extraordinary period over the last 13 years where both stocks and bonds have benefited profoundly from Federal Reserve policy, just to put it bluntly, and, you know, the direction of overall interest rates. And so, our observation has been that, you know, over the last 13 years, U.S. stocks have compounded at close to 15% per year, U.S. bonds have compounded at 9% per year. Both of those are well above long run averages. And so we're now at a point where both stocks and bonds are quite expensive. They are both correlated to each other, and they are both correlated to a large extent with Federal Reserve policy. And as we know, Federal Reserve policy by dint of what appears to be inflation that is not as transitory as the Fed originally thought is causing the Fed to have to accelerate their shift in policy. And I think, as we noted over the last three to six weeks, you know, the Fed's position has gone from, you know, we're going to taper and have three hikes to we're going to taper be done by March. We may have as many as four or five hikes and we're going to consider a balance sheet runoff. That's an awful lot for both stocks and bonds to digest at the same time, especially when they're correlated with one another.

Andrew Sheets And Lisa, you know, if I can just dive into this a little bit more, how do you think about portfolio diversification in that environment you just described, where both stocks and bonds seem increasingly linked to a single common factor, this this direction of Federal Reserve policy?

Lisa Shalett One of the things that we've been emphasizing is to take a step back and to recognize that diversification can happen beyond the simple passive betas of stocks and bonds, which we would, you know, typically represent by, you know, exposures to things like the S&P 500 or a Barclays aggregate. And so what we're saying is, within stocks, you've got to really make an effort to move away from the indexes to higher active managers who tend to take a diversified approach by sector, by style, by market cap. And within fixed income, you know, we're encouraging, clients to hire what we've described as non-core managers. These are managers who may have the ability to navigate the yield curve and navigate the credit environment by using, perhaps what are nontraditional type products. They may employ strategies that include things like preferred shares or covered call strategies, or own asset backed securities. These are all more esoteric instruments that that hiring a manager can give our clients sources of income. And last, you know, we're obviously thinking about generating income and diversification using real assets and alternatives as well.

Andrew Sheets And so, Lisa, one other thing you know, related to that portfolio construction challenge, I also just want to ask you about was how you think about inflation protection. I mean, obviously, I think a lot of investors are trying to achieve the highest return relative to the overall level of prices relative to inflation. You know, how do you think from a portfolio context, investors can try to add some inflation protection here in a smart, you know, intelligent way?

Lisa Shalett So you know what we've tried to say is let's take a step back and think about, you know, our forecast for, you know, whether inflation is going to accelerate from here or decelerate. And you know, I think our position has broadly been that that we do think we're probably at a rate of change turning point for inflation, that we're not headed for a 1970s style level of inflation and that, you know, current readings are probably, you know, closer to peak than not and that we're probably going to mean revert to something closer to the, you know, two and a half to three and a half percent range sooner rather than later. And so in the short term, you know, we've tried to take an approach that says, not only do you want to think about real assets, these are things like real estate, like commodities like gold, like energy infrastructure linked assets that have historically provided some protection to inflation but really go back to those tried and true quality oriented stocks where there is pricing power. Because, you know, 2.5-3.5% Inflation is the type of inflation environment where companies who do have very strong brands who do have very moored competitive positions tend to be able to navigate, you know, better than others and pass some of that the cost increases on to consumers.

Andrew Sheets So, Lisa, that takes me to the next thing I want to talk to you about. You know, investors also care about their return after the effects of tax, and the effects of tax can be quite complex and quite varied. So, you know, as you think about that challenge from a portfolio construction standpoint, why do you think it's critical that investors incorporate tax efficient investing strategies into their portfolios?

Lisa Shalett Well, look, you know, managing, tax and what we call tax drag is always important. And the reason is it's that invisible levy, if you will, on performance. Most of our clients are savvy enough to suss out, you know, the fees that they're paying and understand how the returns are, you know, gross returns are diluted by high fees. But what is less obvious is that some of the investment structures that clients routinely use-- things like mutual funds, things like limited partnership stakes-- very often in both public and private settings, are highly tax inefficient where, you know, taxable gain pass throughs are highly unpredictable, and clients tend to get hit with them. And so that's, you know, part of what we try to do year in, year out is be attentive to making sure that the clients are in tax efficient strategies. That having been said, what we also want to do is minimize tax drag over time. But in a year like 2022, where you know, we're potentially looking at low single digit or even negative returns for some of these asset classes, saving money in taxes can make the difference between, you know, an account that that is at a loss for the full year or at a gain. So there's work to be done. There's this unique window of opportunity right now in the beginning of 2022 to do it. And happily, we have, you know, some of these tools to speed the implementation of that type of an approach.

Andrew Sheets So Lisa, let's wrap this up with how investors can implement this advice with their investments. You know, what strategies could they consider? And I'm also just wondering, you know, if there's any way to just kind of put some numbers around, you know, what are kind of the upper limits of how much these kind of tax drags, you know, can have on performance?

Lisa Shalett Yeah. So that's a great question. So over time, through the studies that we've done, we believe that tax optimization in any given year can add, you know, somewhere between 200 and 300 full basis points to portfolio performance, literally by reducing that tax bill through intelligent tax loss harvesting, intelligent product selection, you know, choosing products that are more tax efficient, et cetera.

Andrew Sheets Well, Lisa, I think that's a great place to end it. Thanks for taking the time to talk. We hope to have you back soon.

Lisa Shalett Absolutely, Andrew. Happy New Year!

Andrew Sheets As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

All eyes are on the Fed as they implement a sharp pivot to account for higher inflation being felt by consumers and businesses alike. With these shifts we turn our attention to the ‘Ice’ portion of our ‘Fire & Ice’ narrative: slowing growth.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday, January 24th at 11:30 a.m. in New York. So let's get after it.

Investors have recently become fixated on the Fed's every move. That makes sense, with the Fed pivoting so aggressively on policy over the past few months. It also fits nicely with the first part of our well-established "Fire and Ice" narrative and our view that equity valuations are vulnerable. The reason for the Fed's sharp pivot is obvious, as inflation has overshot its goals - leading to problems for the real economy, not to mention the White House. When the Fed first announced its inflation targeting policy in the summer of 2020, it was appropriate given the deflationary effects of the pandemic. Therefore, it's now just as appropriate for the Fed to tighten at an accelerated pace to fight the inflation overshoot. However, this is a big change for a Fed that has been fighting the risk of deflation for 20+ years, and it has market implications.

Importantly, consumers are truly starting to feel the impacts of inflation, with the University of Michigan Confidence Survey currently at levels typically observed only in recessions. Small businesses are also feeling the pain, as demonstrated by their difficulty finding employees and the prices that they are paying for supply and logistics. In short, the Fed is serious about fighting inflation, and it's unlikely they will be turning dovish anytime soon, given the seriousness of these economic threats and the political cover to take action.

The good news is that markets have been digesting this tightening for months. Despite the fact that major U.S. large cap equity indices are only down 10-15% from their highs, the damage under the surface has been much worse for many individual stocks. Expensive, unprofitable companies are down 30-50%. This is appropriate, in our view, not just because the Fed is pivoting, but because these kinds of valuations don't make sense in any kind of investment environment. In short, the froth is coming out of an equity market that simply got too extended on valuation - the key part of our 2022 outlook published in November.

But attention should now turn to the Ice part of our narrative - slowing growth. As we've been writing for months, we view the current deceleration in growth as more about the natural ebbing of the cycle than the latest variant of COVID. In fact, there are reasons to believe that we are closer to the end than the beginning of this pandemic. However, that also means the end of extraordinary stimulus, both monetary and fiscal. It also means looser supply chains as restrictions ease and people fully return back to work. Better supply is good for fighting inflation, but it may also reveal the degree to which demand has been supported and overstated by double ordering.

This would fit nicely with the 1940s analogy that we have also detailed in our 2022 outlook. In brief, the end of the Second World War freed pent up savings and unleashed demand into an economy unable to supply it. Double digit inflation ensued, which led to the first Fed rate hike in over a decade and the beginning of the end of financial repression. Sound familiar? Shortly thereafter, inflation plummeted as demand normalized, but the Fed never returned to the zero bound on interest rates. Instead, we began a new era of shorter booms and busts as the world adjusted to the higher levels of demand, as well as cost of capital and labor.

The end of secular stagnation and financial repression has arrived, in our view, but it won't be a smooth ride. In the near term, hunker down for a few more months of winter as slowing growth overtakes the Fed as the primary concern for markets. In such a world, we continue to favor value over growth, but with a defensive rather than cyclical bias.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people to find the show.

Higher levels of inflation have made it a hot topic among investors. While inflation’s effects cannot be avoided completely, there are some strategies that can help protect against the worst of them.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross-Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape and how we put those ideas together. It's Friday, January 21st at 2:00 p.m. in London.

One question we get a lot at the moment is “how can I protect my investments against inflation?”. While Morgan Stanley's economists do expect inflation to moderate this year - actually starting this quarter - the high current readings on inflation have made it a hot topic.

One of the biggest investing challenges with inflation is that when it's truly high and persistent - the kind of inflation that we saw in, say, the 1970s - it's simply bad for everything. That decade saw stocks, bonds and real estate all perform poorly. There was simply nowhere to hide. Still, investors do look at specific strategies to try to hedge inflation. Unfortunately, some of these, we think, have challenges.

One place that investors look to protect against the effects of inflation is precious metals, like gold. But while gold has a very impressive track record of maintaining value throughout thousands of years of human history, its day to day and month to month relationship with inflation is kind of shaky. Gold can actually do worse when interest rates rise because gold, which doesn't provide any income, starts to look worse relative to bonds, which do. And note that over the last six months, when inflation has been elevated, gold hasn't performed particularly well.

Another popular strategy is owning treasury inflation protected securities, or TIPS, which have a payout linked to inflation. I mean, the inflation protection is in the name. Yet if you look at the actual performance of these securities, that inflation protection isn't always so simple. TIPS performed well in 2020, a year when inflation was low, and they performed poorly in 2018 and over the last three months, when inflation was higher. The reason for this is that TIPS are also sensitive to the overall level of interest rates - and if those are going up, they can see their performance suffer.

These two examples are part of the reason that, when we think about protecting portfolios against elevated inflation, what we're often trying to do is to avoid sensitivity to real interest rates, which, at the moment, we think will continue to rise. We think this favors keeping lighter exposure overall, favoring energy over metals and commodities, favoring stocks in Europe and Japan over those in the U.S. and emerging markets, and being underweight real interest rates directly in government bonds.

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to Thoughts on the Market on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen and leave us a review. We'd love to hear from you.

The foundation for the housing market remains healthy in 2022, with responsible lending standards and a tight supply environment, but, as the year continues, affordability challenges and a more hawkish Fed will likely slow appreciation and dampen housing activity.

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James Egan Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm James Egan, co-head of U.S. Securitized Products Research here at Morgan Stanley,

Jay Bacow And I'm Jay Bacow, the other co-head of U.S. Securitized Products Research.

James Egan And on this edition of the podcast, we'll be talking about the 2022 outlook for the U.S. housing market. It's Thursday, January 20th at 10:00 a.m. in New York.

James Egan All right, Jay. Now, since we published the outlook for 2022, the market has already priced in a much more hawkish Fed and Fed board members really haven't been pushing back. We've now priced in 100 basis points of hikes in 2022 in addition to quantitative tightening. How does this change how you're thinking about the mortgage market?

Jay Bacow When we went into the year, we thought that mortgage spreads looked pretty tight and thought they were going to go wider, and that was in a world where we just thought the Fed was going to be tapering and stop buying mortgages, but still reinvesting. Now that they're pricing in that the Fed is going to be hiking rates and normalizing their balance sheet, mortgage spreads have widened about 20 basis points this year, but we think they have further room to go. This is because a normalizing Fed is going to mean that the supply to the market in conjunction with the net issuance is going to be the highest that the private market has ever had to digest. So, we think that could push spreads about 10 or 15 basis points wider, which is going to weigh on mortgage rates, but mortgage rates have already been going up. They are about 3/8 of a point higher just over the last month. And when we forecast mortgage spreads and interest rates to go higher over the next year, we think this could end up with about a full point rise in mortgage rates this year.

Jay Bacow So, Jim, a point move higher in mortgage rates. What does that do to affordability?

James Egan The short answer is they don't help affordability. For people who've been listening to our podcast before, affordability largely has three main components: home prices, mortgage rates and incomes. And so, if we're talking about mortgage rates, a full 100 basis points higher, that's going to be bad for affordability. But look, this just reinforces what we're thinking about affordability with respect to the housing market as we look ahead to 2022. In our outlook, we described affordability as the chief headwind to home prices and housing activity this year. Looking back to the end of 2021, home prices were climbing at a record pace of growth. And one of the good things about this climb is we think it's been healthier than the prior times that HPA even approached these levels. We got to almost 20% year over year growth because of the fact that we had an historically tight supply environment, and we had a lot of demand, and that demand was not being stimulated by easing lending standards. Lending standards themselves remained very responsible.

James Egan But just because the foundation of the housing market today is healthy, and we believe it is, that doesn't mean it can't be too expensive. As home prices were climbing, mortgage rates continued to fall to record lows, and that really acted as a release valve with respect to affordability in the market. That release valve has already been turned off. Mortgage rates climbed throughout 2021. We expected them to climb in 2022. Yes, we now see them climbing faster than we anticipated, but that release Valve, as I mentioned, was already turned off. Affordability was already a substantial headwind in our call.

Jay Bacow All right, Jim. So, we've talked about affordability. Can you remind us where do home prices currently stand? Haven't they started to come down a little bit?

James Egan Yes. Home prices have been slowing for two months now. And it's becoming more pervasive geographically.

James Egan As recently as July, 100 of the top 100 metro areas in the country, were not only seeing home prices grow year over year, but that pace of growth was accelerating. Five months later, the most recent data we have there is November, it's fallen from 100 out of 100 to 38 out of 100 metro areas, still seeing acceleration. The other 62? They're still climbing. But the pace of that growth has slowed.

Jay Bacow All right, so home price growth is slowing. Does this mean that it just continues to slow and home prices actually go negative this year?

James Egan We do think that home price growth will continue to slow, but we definitively think it will remain positive. We do not see home price growth going negative on a year over year basis. One of the biggest reasons there: healthy lending standards that we mentioned earlier. That kind of responsible underwriting we think keeps distressed transactions, so delinquencies - really foreclosures. It keeps those distressed transactions limited, and you really need an increase in the concentration of distressed transactions to see home price growth turn negative, or to see home prices turn negative.

James Egan One of the other things we talked about affordability that we do think is playing a role in the housing market is supply. The supply market is at historical tights right now. That contributes to the healthy foundation that we see the housing market sitting on. We do think we are going to start to see a supply increase on the margins next year. Existing inventories continue to fall, but new inventories have been up over 30% year over year each of the past four months. While single unit starts might not be climbing at the same pace today as they were early in 2021, if we look at the number of single unit homes under construction today, that's surpassed the number of multi-unit homes under construction for the first time since 2013. We do think that will mean more supply coming on the market next year.

James Egan The overall environment will be tight. But we will no longer be able to say historically tight. We will see positive year over year changes. That also weighs on the pace of home price growth, which is why we see it slowing to 5% by 2022.

Jay Bacow OK, but Jim, you talked about supply and how that's been picking up recently, but that was based off of a period when mortgage rates are lower than they are today. What is this forecasted rise in mortgage rates mean for your expectations for housing activity going forward for the rest of 2022?

James Egan So I think there's a few ways that this rise in mortgage rates can impact housing activity. The I think most straightforward way to think about it is on the affordability spectrum that we've been talking about. It's going to make the carrying cost, the debt service of housing those mortgage payments more expensive for households. And that affordability problem is going to weigh on purchase decisions that, as I mentioned earlier, reinforces what we were already thinking about the housing market this year. It also contributes to a lock in effect - borrowers that have homes at lower mortgage rates, it now increases their opportunity costs to move. They'd have to take on a larger mortgage if they were to move their home, and so it weighs on supply as well.

James Egan We see it leading to a decrease in existing home sales. So home prices will slow, but they'll remain positive. We do think that home sales are going to fall. Throughout the totality of 2022 we see existing home sales coming in about 5% below where they'll finish 2021.

Jay Bacow All right. So basically, a more hawkish Fed has meant that mortgage spreads have widened out and mortgage rates are heading higher. This has led to reduced affordability, which is also going to cause a bit of a slowdown in home sale activity and a slowdown in home price appreciation. But home prices will still near higher than where they are now. I got that right?

James Egan Absolutely.

James Egan Jay, thanks for taking the time to chat.

Jay Bacow Always a pleasure, Jim.

James Egan As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please take a moment to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

In 2021, many expected the US dollar to face significant challenges yet the year ended with strong levels coming off a mid-year rally. As we look out at 2022, how much more can the dollar rise and where do other currency opportunities lie?

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm James Lord, Global Head of Foreign Exchange and Emerging Market Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the outlook for the US dollar and global currency markets. It's Wednesday, January 19th at 2:00 p.m. in London.

This time last year, many strategists on Wall Street were expecting 2021 to turn out badly for the US dollar. But as we now know, the dollar ended the year much differently. The dollar troughed on January 6th, spent the first half of the year moving sideways, then began a pretty strong rally mid-year and finished the year around the strongest levels since July of 2020. And the question we've all been asking ourselves recently is - how much more can the dollar rise in 2022?

Well, this year, most analysts and investors expect the dollar to continue to rise. But if last year's track record of prediction is anything to go by, this probably means that the dollar could instead head lower over the next 12 months. Our team at Morgan Stanley believes that the US dollar could be close to peaking. In fact, we've just changed our dollar call to neutral, which means we think it will just go sideways from here - after being bullish the dollar since June last year.

Here's why: the Federal Reserve has indicated it may be close to raising interest rates, and we think that the Fed starting an interest rate hiking cycle could be a signal that the dollar's rise is close to finished. This may seem counterintuitive, since rising interest rates tend to strengthen currencies. But the US dollar has actually already gone up on the back of rising interest rates. A year ago, the market wasn't expecting any rate hikes for the year ahead. Now, the market is expecting nearly four hikes and for lift off to potentially begin as soon as March.

If we look back at the last five cycles where the Fed has hiked interest rates, we can see the same pattern every time. The US dollar tends to rise in the months before liftoff, but fall in the months afterwards. This is a great example of buying the rumor and selling the fact.

And if the market is right and the Fed hikes rates as soon as March, the peak of the US dollar for this cycle may not be too far away.

We also need to remember that the dollar doesn't stand in isolation. Currencies are always a relative game and are valued against the currencies of other economies. Because of that, what happens in other parts of the world also affects the value of the US dollar. And what we've seen recently is that other central banks are also starting to think about tightening policy and raising interest rates, which will, to some extent, offset Fed hikes - reducing their impact on the dollar.

We think this may be a good time for investors to start to reduce their dollar long positions, not add to them.

What does the future hold for emerging market currencies? The consensus view is very negative on emerging markets, and that is the polar opposite of this time last year when everybody loved them. Like last year, though, we suspect the consensus view will probably be wrong by the time we close the year. Valuations on emerging market currencies and local currency bonds are cheap. If inflation peaks over the next few months, as Morgan Stanley economists expect, then investors may well take another look at emerging market bonds and any inflows would strengthen their currencies.

Bottom line: the dollar has probably peaked for the year, but the future for emerging market currencies is brighter than most people think. As ever, the trick is in the timing. Stay tuned.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share the podcast with a friend or colleague today.

While our outlook for 2022 already called for a hawkish Fed, recent signals from the central bank of more aggressive tightening have given cause to reexamine some of our calls while remaining steadfast in key aspects of our narrative for the year.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Tuesday, January 18th at 11:30 a.m. in New York. So, let's get after it.

Last week, our economics team adjusted its forecast on Fed policy, given the more hawkish tone in the most recent Fed minutes and commentary from Chair Powell and other governors. We now expect the Fed to fully exit its asset purchase program known as quantitative easing by April. We also expect the Fed to increase rates by 25 basis points 4 times this year and begin balance sheet normalization by July. That's a lot of tightening, and fits with our general outlook for 2022 that we published back in November. To recall, our Fire and Ice narrative assumed the Fed was behind the curve and would need to catch up in a hurry, given the dramatic move in inflation that we've experienced during this pandemic. Public outcry and consumer confidence measures suggest inflation is the number one concern right now - making this a political issue as much as an economic one. Expect the Fed to keep pushing until financial conditions tighten.

What that means for equity markets is that valuations should come down this year via a combination of higher long term interest rates and higher equity risk premiums. The changes to our Fed forecast simply mean it's likely to happen faster now, making the hand-off between lower valuations and higher earnings more challenging. This is the classic finishing move to the mid-cycle transition we've been anticipating for months, and it appears we've finally arrived.

Our outlook for 2022 incorporated a fairly hawkish Fed, and while that hawkishness has increased since we published in mid-November, it doesn't change our year-end targets, which are already well below the consensus. Specifically, our base case year-end target for the S&P 500 is 4400. This compares to the median forecast of approximately 4900. Our target assumes a meaningfully lower Price Earnings multiple of 18x the forward 12-month earnings. This would be a 15% drop from the current Price Earnings multiple of 21x. Our EPS forecast is largely in line with consensus. In short, our view differs with consensus mainly on valuation rather than growth.

The faster ending to QE and more aggressive rate hikes simply brings this valuation risk forward to the first half of the year. Furthermore, given the Fed's new guidance it will try to shrink its balance sheet, means valuations could even overshoot to the downside of what we think is fair value. Bottom line, the bringing forward of tapering and rate hikes is likely to lead to a 10-20% correction in the first half of this year for the S&P 500, in our view.

The good news is that markets have been adjusting for months to this new reality, with 40% of the Nasdaq having corrected by 50% or more. As we've noted many times, the breadth of the market remains poor as it goes through the classic rolling correction under the surface as the index grinds higher. This phenomenon is largely due to the relentless inflows from retail investors into equities. On one hand, this rotation from bonds to stocks by asset owners makes perfect sense in a world of rising prices. After all, stocks are a decent hedge against inflation, unlike bonds. However, certain stocks fit that billing better than others. In its simplest form, it means value over growth stocks or short duration over long - think dividend growth stocks. In addition, we would favor defensively oriented value stocks relative to cyclicals, given our view growth may slow a bit more in the near term before re-accelerating in the second half. Bottom line, don't fight the Fed and be patient with new capital deployments until later this Spring.

Thanks for listening! If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

After two years of support and accommodation from the Fed, 2022 is seeing a shift in tone towards the strength of the economy and risks of inflation, meaning investors may need to reassess expectations for the year.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross-Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape and how we put those ideas together. It's Friday, January 14th at 2:00 p.m. in London.

Sometimes in investing, if you're lucky, you make a forecast that holds up for a long time. Other times, the facts change, and your assumptions need to change with them. We've just made some significant shifts to our assumptions for what the Federal Reserve will do this year. I want to discuss these new expectations and how we got there.

The U.S. Federal Reserve influences interest rates through two main policy tools. First, it sets a target rate of interest for very short-term borrowing, which influences a lot of other interest rates. And second, it can buy government bonds and mortgages directly - influencing the rate that these bonds offer.

When COVID struck, the Federal Reserve pulled hard on both of these levers, cutting its target interest rate to its lowest ever level of zero and buying trillions of government bonds and mortgages to support these markets.

But now, almost two years removed from those actions, the tone from the Fed is changing, and quickly. For much of 2021, its message focused on erring on the side of caution and continuing to provide extraordinary support, even as the U.S. economy was clearly recovering.

But now, that improvement is clear. The U.S. unemployment rate has fallen all the way to 3.9%, lower than where it was in January of 2018. The number of Americans claiming unemployment benefits is the lowest since 1973. And meanwhile, inflation has been elevated - with the U.S. consumer prices up 7% over the last year.

All of this helps explain the sharp shift we've seen recently in the Fed's tone, which is now focusing much more on the strength of the economy, the risks of inflation and the need to dial back some of its policy support. It's this change of rhetoric, as well as that underlying data that's driven our economists to change their forecasts for the Federal Reserve.

We now expect the Fed to raise interest rates 4 times this year, by a total of 1%. Just as important, we think they not only stop buying bonds in March, but start reducing their bond holdings later in the year - moving from quantitative easing, or QE, to so-called quantitative tightening, or QT. The result should help push U.S. 10-year yields higher up to 2.2%, in our view, by the middle of the year.

For markets, we think this should continue to drive a bumpy first quarter for U.S. and emerging market assets. We think European stocks and financial stocks, which are both less sensitive to changes in interest rates, should outperform.

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to Thoughts on the Market on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen and leave us a review. We'd love to hear from you.

Confirmation hearings for Fed Chair Powell’s second term highlighted the challenges for the year ahead. Inflation concerns fueled by high demand and disrupted supply chains, a tight labor market and the trajectory of the ongoing pandemic will make guessing the Fed’s next moves difficult in 2022.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, Head of Public Policy Research and Municipal Strategy for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues, bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the intersection between U.S. public policy and financial markets. It's Thursday, January 13th at 10:00 a.m. in New York.

A key focus in D.C. this week is the Senate confirmation hearings for Fed Chair Jay Powell, who's been nominated for another term at the helm of the Federal Reserve. Whenever the Fed chair speaks, it's must-see TV for bond investors. And this remains as true as ever this week.

See, the Fed has a really tough job ahead of them. The economy is humming, and it's nearing time to tighten monetary policy and rein in inflation. We know from their most recent meeting minutes that the Fed sees it this way. But how quickly to do it, and by what method to do it, well, that's more up for debate. That's because, in fairness to the Fed, there's no real template for the challenge that's ahead of them. The pandemic and the economic recovery from it have presented an unusual and hard to gauge set of inputs to monetary policy decision making. Take inflation, for example. There's no shortage of potential overlapping causes for the currently high inflation reads: supply chain bottlenecks; an unprecedented rapid rebound in demand for goods, both in absolute terms and relative to services; a sluggish labor force participation rate; and, influencing each of these variables, the trajectory of a global pandemic. The Fed's job, of course, is to assess to what degree these factors are temporary or enduring, and calibrate monetary policy accordingly to bring inflation to target. But to state the obvious, this is complicated.

So it's not surprising that the recent Fed minutes showed they're considering a wide range of monetary tightening options. A lot is on the table around the number of rate hikes, pace of rate hikes and pace of balance sheet normalization. We expect Chair Powell will be further underscoring this desire for optionality in monetary policy in his forthcoming statements.

Of course, another phrase for optionality might be policy uncertainty, and this is exactly the point we think bond investors should focus on. Precisely guessing the Fed's every move is likely less important than understanding the Fed has, and can continue, to change its approach to monetary tightening as it collects more data and better understands the current inflation dynamic. This is the genesis of the recent uptick in bond market volatility, which we expect will be an enduring feature of 2022.

But volatility can mean opportunity, particularly for credit investors, in our view. Corporate and municipal bond credit quality is very strong, but both markets have a history of underperforming during moments of Treasury market volatility. That's why my colleagues and I are recommending for both asset classes to start the year with portfolios positioned cautiously, allowing you to take advantage of better valuations when they present themselves. In this way, like the Fed, you too will have options to deal with uncertainty.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague or leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. It helps more people find the show.

As the acute bottlenecks in supply chains resolve in the long-term, some structural issues may remain, creating both opportunities and challenges for policymakers, industry leaders, and investors.

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Michael Zezas Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, head of public policy research and municipal strategy for Morgan Stanley.

Daniel Blake And I'm Daniel Blake, equity strategist covering Asia and emerging markets.

Michael Zezas And on part two of this special edition of the podcast. We'll be assessing the long term restructuring of global supply chains and how this transition may impact investors. It's Wednesday, January 12th at 9 a.m. in New York.

Daniel Blake And it's 10:00 p.m. in Hong Kong.

Michael Zezas So, Daniel, we discussed the short and medium term for supply chains, but as we broaden out our horizon, which challenges are temporary and which are more structural?

Daniel Blake We do think there are structural challenges that are emerging and have been present for some time, but have been exacerbated by the COVID pandemic and by this surge in demand that we're seeing and a panic about ordering. So we are seeing them most acute in areas of transportation where we don't expect a return to pre-COVID levels of freight rates or indeed lead times. We also see more acute pressures persisting in parts of the leading edge supply chain in semiconductors, as well as in areas of restructuring around decarbonization, for example, in EV materials and the battery supply chain. But more temporary areas are those that have been subject to short-term production shortfalls and areas where we are seeing demand that has been pulled forward in some regards and where we are also seeing the channel being restocked in areas that were not necessarily production disrupted. And so this in the tech space, for example, is more acute in some consumer electronics categories as opposed to autos, where we do have very lean inventory positions and it will take longer to rebuild.

Daniel Blake But in the short run, we do think what will be important to watch will be the development of new COVID variants and the responses from policymakers and public health officials to those and the extent to which production and distribution can be managed in the context of those challenges. So really, I think a lot comes back to the public policy decision. So what are you seeing and tracking most closely from here?

Michael Zezas Yeah, I think it's important to focus on the choices made by policymakers globally. You and I have talked about and reported on this concept of a multi-polar world. This idea that there are multiple economic power poles and that each of them might be pursuing somewhat different strategies when it comes to trade rules, tech standards, supply chain standards, et cetera. So I think the US-China dynamic is a great example of this. Obviously, over the last several years, the U.S. and China have shifted to a model where they define for themselves what they think is in their best economic and national security interest and in order to promote those interests, adopt a set of policies that are both defensive and offensive. So with the U.S., for example, there were tariff increases in 2018 and 2019. Since then, they have mostly shifted to raising non-tariff barriers like export restriction controls and increasingly over the last year have also been pivoting towards offensive tactics. So promoting legislation to invest in reshoring like the US ICA. So what this means then is that companies that had been benefiting from globalization and access to end markets and production processes in the U.S. and China now may need to recalibrate and take on new costs when they're transitioning their value chain for these conditions of kind of new barriers, new frictions in commerce between the U.S. and China.

Daniel Blake And take us through the corporate perspective. What are you seeing and how should we think about the corporate response to these supply chain challenges?

Michael Zezas A conceptual framework we laid out was to put different types of corporate sectors into categories based on how much their production processes or end markets were subject to increasing trade and transportation friction and or subject to labor shortages. And we came up with four different categories using these two axes. The first category is bottlenecks, where you have tight labor conditions and increasing trade and transportation friction, leaves these industries little choice but to pass through higher costs. Reshorers is another category where you're potentially facing further production cost hikes from trade and transportation friction but these firms are increasingly interested in domestic investment that can steady their supply chain challenges. There's also global diversifiers where trade and transportation frictions may be steady, but labor scarcity and disruption risk creates margin pressure. So that pushes sectors like these to invest in geographical supply chain diversification so they can access new labor pools and automation technology that increases their productivity. And the last category is new globalizers. So this is a relatively capital intensive industry or an industry that's able to source labor globally, given limited impact from trade and transportation frictions. It really means that these business models might be able to pursue the status quo and not have to change much at all.

Michael Zezas So, Daniel, do you have some examples of industries that might fit into these categories and how that might presents either an opportunity or a challenge for investors?

Daniel Blake We have looked at this at the sector and company level for major companies impacted by this theme of supply chain restructuring. And what I would highlight is that semiconductors are the classic bottleneck industries. They have been the acute choke points in the global economy. They have seen rising pricing power. They have seen a significant investment going in, and that has been benefiting the semiconductor capital equipment names. In terms of the reshorers, we think naturally to the US capital goods cycle. And here, our analysts has highlighted more vertical integration and really securing more of the parts supply chain, really a shortening of supply chains that is a response to these supply chain uncertainties that have emerged. And then on global diversifier, this category here, we think, is quite relevant to a lot of the tech hardware space. So semiconductors is more higher tech and more capital intensive. And in contrast, the tech hardware space tends to be more associated with assembly, distribution, marketing. And here we do think that there is potential for more diversification to broaden out exposure across supply chains and labor pools going forward. And finally, on new globalizers, overall, the key categories we have looked at in this report, we didn't see falling into this bucket. But we do think there are sectors that will continue to be new globalizers, and we see them more in the consumer and services oriented spaces of the of the global economy.

Michael Zezas So our framework represents a view of how things will settle globally over the medium to long term in a bit of a mixed picture where some sectors benefit, others have to transition through higher costs. But are there alternative cases, Daniel, where things could be better for the global economy or worse for the global economy than is envisioned in this framework we laid out?

Daniel Blake If we turn to the bull case for the global economy, what we're really looking at is a scenario where demand remains manageable and supported. But we're seeing additional supply come through and an easing of supply chain tensions. So there we would look first to the demand side of the equation, given supply takes longer to ramp up. And for us, a bull case would see a recovery of consumption skewed towards services spending that has been held back by the pandemic, and that helps keep the jobs and earnings recovery moving. But it eases some of the stress on the goods supply chain that may also be alleviated by the acute bottlenecks that we talk about in our base case, resolving and taking some more anxiety out of purchasing managers equation into 2022. In contrast, the bear case is quite clear the acute risk at this point is around new COVID variants, the impact on production and transport, as we saw just recently. So the potential for a rerun of these restrictions is very much in front of us as we're seeing selective lockdowns at time of recording starting to come through in some cities in China. At this point not impacting production materially but that is something we are watching closely. And that means we do think there is potential for demand destruction. The policy response may not be as forthcoming with the scale of stimulus that we saw through 2020 and 2021.

Michael Zezas Daniel, thanks for taking the time to talk.

Daniel Blake Great speaking with you, Michael.

Michael Zezas And thanks for listening. If you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please be sure to rate and review us on the Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

Supply chain delays are on the minds of not only investors, policymakers and business owners, but the average consumer as well. How will recent challenges to supply chains be resolved in the near-term and will this create opportunity for investors?

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Michael Zezas Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Michael Zezas, head of public policy research and municipal strategy for Morgan Stanley.

Daniel Blake And I'm Daniel Blake, equity strategist covering Asia and emerging markets,

Michael Zezas And on part one of this special edition of the podcast. We'll be assessing the near-term restructuring of global supply chains and how this transition may impact investors. It's Tuesday, January 11th at 9 a.m. in New York.

Daniel Blake And it's 10:00 p.m. in Hong Kong.

Michael Zezas So, Daniel, we recently collaborated on a report, "Global Supply Chains, Repair, Restructuring and investment Implications." In it, we take a look at the story for supply chains over the short, medium and long term. Now, obviously supply chains are on the minds of not only investors and policymakers, but the average consumer as well. So I think the best place to start is, how did we get here?

Daniel Blake Thanks, Mike. What we're seeing actually is a surge in demand for goods, particularly coming out of the US economy. As we're seeing accommodation of a record stimulus program post-World War Two, combined with a share in spending that has shifted from services towards goods that has been unprecedented. For example, to put this in context, we're seeing U.S. consumer spending on goods increased by 40% in the two years between October 2019, pre-COVID, to October 2021. And that compares with 28% increase that we saw in the entire 11 years following the financial crisis. And so what we're seeing is a sharp fall in services being more than made up for with an increase in spending on goods. And that's put enormous stress on supply chains, production levels, capacity of transportation. And in conjunction with the surge in demand that was seen, we've also seen some acute difficulties emerge in parts of supply chains impacted by COVID. For example, in South Southeast Asia, we've seen semiconductor fabrication, we've seen assembly, and we're seeing components being impacted by staffing issues as a result of COVID health precautions. And this has all been made worse by the uncertainty about sourcing products and lead times. So what we're seeing is manufacturers, we're seeing suppliers, distributors and the and the end corporates that are facing the consumer, putting in additional orders, whether that component is in short supply or not. And so that's increased the stress in the system and created uncertainty about where underlying demand sits

Daniel Blake And so, Mike, amidst this uncertainty, policymakers have really taken note of the issues, not least because of the inflation that's been generated. What reactions are you seeing from the administration, from Congress and from the Fed?

Michael Zezas This is obviously unprecedented volatility in the behavior of the American consumer. And so not surprisingly, in the U.S., policymakers don't have the types of tools immediately at their disposal to deal with this. So you've actually seen the administration pull the levers that they can, but they're relatively limited. They've made certain moneys available, for example, for overtime work for port workers and transportation workers to help speed along the process of inventory accumulating at different ports of entry in the US. But there aren't really any comprehensive tools beyond that that are being used.

Michael Zezas Daniel, what about policymakers in Asia and emerging markets? How are they reacting?

Daniel Blake Yeah. In the short run, we're seeing a combination of tightening of monetary policy. For example, over 70% of emerging markets have been hiking rates by the fourth quarter of 2021. But we're also seeing competition for investment in global supply chains as they are being diversified by OEMs and as we're seeing some restructuring taking place. So we're seeing overall this competition happening across the value chain from battery materials like lithium and nickel in markets like Indonesia all the way through to leading edge 3D semiconductor manufacturing, where companies in Japan are partnering with industry leader Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Corporation to try to pursue leading edge technology. So we are seeing this competition being a key feature of medium term trends.

Michael Zezas So, Daniel, clearly a challenge in the near term to supply chains in the economy. What's our view on how this resolves itself?

Daniel Blake Yeah, we have identified in conjunction with the global research team the most acute choke points, the primary choke points. And the short answer is we are seeing improvement in these in these areas. For example, in semiconductors, manufacturing capacity in in the backend foundry that was seen in Southeast Asia, we are seeing production come back in towards full capacity. And so we are seeing a real easing in the most acute bottlenecks. That should be good news for overall production levels and the most severe shortages. But at the same time, we do have some more persistent challenges, including rising costs and delays in transportation, as it will take some investment and multiple years likely to resolve the issues that we're seeing in labor shortages in areas like US trucking, in port capacity, intermodal capacity in the US. And as we see some persistent areas of demand really pushing for more investment, for example, in EV materials and the battery supply chain.

Michael Zezas OK, so the most acute stresses we see resolving in the near term, and that's one of the reason, for example, our economists expect that inflation pressures will start to ease this quarter and into next. And as a consequence, the Fed will hike rates this year, but not necessarily according to the more aggressive schedule that they previously laid out. Daniel, what do you think are some of the more micro investment implications, sectoral investment implications, that we should pay attention to here?

Daniel Blake Yeah, we are tracking very closely these key bottleneck segments in the global economy because we have seen companies producing those products have been sharp outperformers. And the challenge is obviously recognizing where these shortages will persist and where we see sustained pricing power. We do see that in some areas the semiconductors are continuing, we are still seeing investment channels in EV materials being a key source of demand. But on the flip side, we're also seeing an outlook for a reprieve in supply chains. As we mentioned some of the more acute challenges, for example, in auto production that may actually be a negative for some major semi companies, as they've benefited from these stronger margins. And so as that pricing pressure diminishes, we think investor consensus is somewhat too optimistic on this shortage and backlog persisting longer into 2022. In terms of implications, then that should be more of a positive for volume league players, for example, auto parts makers that have been held up in terms of their shipments as a result of shortages in other parts of the value chain. And the longer term, another favored investment theme coming out of the report is the likely strength of the US capex cycle in response to these challenges that we're seeing for supply chains.

Michael Zezas Thanks for listening. We'll be back in your feed soon with part two of my conversation with Daniel Blake on the restructuring of global supply chains. As a reminder, if you enjoy Thoughts on the Market, please make sure to rate and review us on. The Apple Podcasts app. It helps more people find the show.

As the year gets underway, we are seeing an aggressive rotation from growth to value stocks, triggered by Fed tapering. Will 2022 follow the patterns of the ‘taper tantrum’ of 2013?

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Mike Wilson, Chief Investment Officer and Chief U.S. Equity Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about the latest trends in the financial marketplace. It's Monday, January 10th at 11:30 a.m. in New York. So let's get after it.

2022 is off to a blazing start with one of the most aggressive rotations from growth to value stocks we've ever seen. However, much of this rotation in the equity markets began back in November, with the Fed's more aggressive pivot on monetary policy. More specifically, the most expensive stocks in the market were down almost 30% in the last two months of 2021. Year to date, this cohort is down another 10%, leaving 40% of the Nasdaq stocks down more than 50% from their highs. Is the correction over in these expensive stocks yet?

What has changed since the turning of the calendar is that longer term interest rates have moved up significantly. In fact, the move in 10-year real rates is one of the sharpest on record and looks similar to the original taper tantrum in 2013. However, as already mentioned, equity markets have been discounting this inevitable move in rates for months. Perhaps the real question is, why is the rates market suddenly waking up to the reality of higher inflation and the Fed's response to it - something it has telegraphed for months? We think it has to do with several tactical supports that are now being lifted. First, the Fed itself likely increased its liquidity provisions at year-end to support the typical constraints in the banking system. Meanwhile, many macro speculators and trading desks likely shut down their books in December, despite their fundamental view to be short bonds. This combination is now reversed and simply added fuel to a fire that had been burning for months under the surface. Based on the move in 2013, it looks like real rates still have further to run, potentially much further. Our rates strategists believe real rates are headed back to negative 50 basis points, which is another 25 basis points higher. From our perspective, real rates are unreasonably negative given the very strong GDP growth. Therefore, the Fed is correct to be trying to get them higher. It's also why tapering may not be tightening for the economy, even though it's the epitome of tightening financial conditions for markets.

We have discussed this comparison to 2013 in prior research and made the following observations as it relates to equity markets. First, the taper tantrum in 2013 was the first of its kind and something for which the markets had not been prepared. Therefore, the move in real rates was much more severe and swift than what we would expect this time around. Second, valuations were much more attractive in 2013 based on both price/earnings multiples and the equity risk premiums, which adjust for absolute levels of rates, which are much lower today. Listeners may find it surprising to learn that the price/earnings multiple for the S&P 500 is actually higher today than when the Fed first announced its plan to taper asset purchases back in September. In other words, valuations have actually increased as the tapering has begun, at least for the broader S&P 500 index.

This is also similar to what happened in 2013 and makes sense. After all, Fed tightening is a good sign for growth and evidence that its policy has been successful. However, this time the starting point on valuations is much higher as already noted. More importantly, growth is decelerating, whereas in 2013 it was accelerating. This applies to both economic and earnings growth. In this kind of an environment, the most expensive parts of the market remain the most vulnerable. This argues for value to outperform growth stocks. However, given the deceleration in growth, we favor the more defensive parts of value rather than the cyclicals like we did during the first quarter of 2021. This means Healthcare, Staples, REITs and Utilities. And some financials for a little offense to offset that portfolio.

Thanks for listening. If you enjoy the show, please leave us a review on Apple Podcasts and share Thoughts on the Market with a friend or colleague today.

The start of 2022 has brought a surge in COVID cases, new payroll data, increased geopolitical risks, and shifts from the Fed. Despite these new developments, we think the themes from our 2022 outlook still apply.

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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheets, Chief Cross-Asset Strategist for Morgan Stanley. Along with my colleagues bringing you a variety of perspectives, I'll be talking about trends across the global investment landscape and how we put those ideas together. It's Friday, January 7th at 2:00 p.m. in London.

Right out of the gates, 2022 is greeting us with a surge of COVID cases, a US unemployment rate below 4%, geopolitical risk and new hawkish Fed communication.

Amidst all these issues, the question waiting for investors is whether the thinking of late last year still holds. We think the main themes of our 2022 outlook still apply - solid growth and tighter policy within an accelerated economic cycle. But clearly, there are now a lot more moving parts.

One of those moving parts is the growth outlook. Our 2022 expectation was that global growth remains above trend, aided by a healthy consumer, robust business investment and healing supply chains. But can that still hold given a new, more contagious COVID variant?

For the moment, we think it can. Our economists note that global growth has become less sensitive to each subsequent COVID wave as vaccination rates have risen, treatment options have improved and the appetite for restrictions has declined. Modeling from Morgan Stanley's US Biotechnology team suggests that cases in Europe and the US could peak within 3-6 weeks, meaning most of this year will play out beyond that peak. Having already factored in a winter wave of some form in our original economic forecast, we don't think, for now, the main story has changed.

There are, however, some wrinkles. Because China is pursuing a different zero COVID policy from other countries, its near-term growth may be more impacted than other regions. And the emergence of this variant likely reinforces another prior expectation: that developed market growth actually exceeds emerging market growth in 2022.

A second moving part is a shift by the Federal Reserve. Last January, the market assumed that the first Fed rate hike would be in April of 2024. Last August? The market thought it would be in April of 2023. And today, pricing implies that the first rate hike will be this March.

An update from the minutes of the Federal Reserve's December meeting, released this week, only further reinforced this idea that the Fed is getting closer and closer to removing support. The Fed discussed raising rates sooner, raising them faster and reducing the amount of securities that they hold.

Indeed, it would seem for the moment that central banks in a lot of countries are increasingly comfortable pushing a more hawkish line until something pushes back. And so far, nothing has. Equity markets are steady, credit spreads are steady and yield curves have steepening over the last month. The opposite of what we would expect if the markets were afraid of a policy mistake.

As such, why should they stop now?

For markets, therefore, our strategy is based on the idea of less central bank support to start the year. Our Foreign Exchange team expects further US dollar appreciation, while our US interest rate strategists think that yields will move higher, especially relative to inflation. We think that combination should be negative for gold but supportive for financial stocks both in the US and around the world.

Thanks for listening. Subscribe to Thoughts on the Market on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen and leave us a review. We'd love to hear from you.