Latest / Bloomberg Intelligence / Fed's Aim Is to Boost Asset Prices; Don't Fight It

Transcript

Fed's Aim Is to Boost Asset Prices; Don't Fight It · Bloomberg Intelligence

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to the Bloomberg Penl Podcast. I'm Paul swing you
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: along with my co host Lisa Brahma Waits. Each day
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  Speaker 1: we bring you the most noteworthy and useful interviews for
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  Speaker 1: you and your money, Whether at the grocery store or
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  Speaker 1: the trading floor. Find a Bloomberg Penl podcast on Apple
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  Speaker 1: podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts, as well as
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: at Bloomberg dot com. The key question, though, in my mind,
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  Speaker 1: as the spire reaches new highs of record highs, how
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  Speaker 1: much can a twenty five bases point rate cut actually
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  Speaker 1: continue to support risk assets? Joining us here Peter Sheer,
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  Speaker 1: head of macro strategy at Academy Securities. Uh, he's here
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  Speaker 1: in our interactive broker studios. Peter, what is the answer
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  Speaker 1: to that? I mean, does this seem like it makes
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  Speaker 1: sense to you that stocks are rallying on this expected
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  Speaker 1: rate cut? Weirdly, it actually does. I'll give you my
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  Speaker 1: real cynical answer in a second. I think the first
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  Speaker 1: thing is what we've seen is a shift in the
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  Speaker 1: FEDS reaction function. I think the reality is they are
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  Speaker 1: going to do very little, too slow the economy. So
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  Speaker 1: if we see any pause of science, they're not going
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  Speaker 1: to react quickly any negatives. They're going to react very
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  Speaker 1: very quickly to help out. So I think that's what's
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  Speaker 1: being priced in. And if you want the cynical answer,
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  Speaker 1: the FED is really out there to boast their asset prices.
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  Speaker 1: That belief is sinking in. That's what they're gonna do.
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  Speaker 1: You trade it that way, you think that that's what's
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  Speaker 1: going on. There's a growing view that power who did
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  Speaker 1: want to kill the power put or the FED put.
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  Speaker 1: I think it's much easier to say you want to
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  Speaker 1: kill it than being the person responsible for it. And
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  Speaker 1: now he's gone the other way. They're there to support
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  Speaker 1: asset prices. So right now, you think that the best
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  Speaker 1: gauge of what the Federal Reserve will too is just
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  Speaker 1: to look at risk assets. If they're selling off, they're
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  Speaker 1: going to cut rates. If they're rallying, they might be
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  Speaker 1: a little bit more patient. Yeah, I think that's it.
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  Speaker 1: So I think we've got one more good squeeze here.
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  Speaker 1: I think we see vick Strop maybe down to eleven,
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  Speaker 1: stocks continue to go higher yields. I think the front
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  Speaker 1: end is gonna be anchored. I think we're actually gonna
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  Speaker 1: see a realization Hey, if the Fed wants inflation, long
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  Speaker 1: endnield should be higher. So I think you're gonna see
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  Speaker 1: tens and thirties back up a little bit, all right,
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  Speaker 1: So how long can this go on before people care
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  Speaker 1: about the real economy again? I think you need to
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  Speaker 1: see the squeeze finish, whether it's two weeks to a month.
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  Speaker 1: I want to see some of the sentiment surveys kind
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  Speaker 1: of get to extremes positive where every last bear gets
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  Speaker 1: pushed in. Okay, so this is this is a tactical
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  Speaker 1: bet on your part. Yes, I think that's what this is. Right,
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  Speaker 1: everyone's kind of having taken this message. Trade wars seem
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  Speaker 1: off the table for now. It's the summer. It's slow,
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  Speaker 1: y be short, this squeeze goes, and then we're set
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  Speaker 1: up for a fall. Okay, So then we're set up
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  Speaker 1: for a fall. So let's move beyond just the next
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  Speaker 1: two weeks to a month and talk about what happens
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  Speaker 1: later in the year as we start to get more
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  Speaker 1: economic data and wage pressure, whatever happens on the trade front,
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  Speaker 1: how much do risk us it's potentially follow in your view,
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  Speaker 1: what's the what's the fallout? Or is this just gonna
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  Speaker 1: be a bumpy road for a while. I think it's
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  Speaker 1: gonna be a bumpy road. To me. The real pause
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  Speaker 1: is going to be if trade wars start leading to
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  Speaker 1: the conclusion that we're actually gonna win, We're gonna fight
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  Speaker 1: for five G and the U s is actually gonna
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  Speaker 1: dominate five G rather than letting whahweh do it. Then
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  Speaker 1: I think risk assets can go off to the races.
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  Speaker 1: If it looks like we're gonna lose, we're gonna cave in,
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  Speaker 1: we're gonna let away dominate. I think we're gonna have
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  Speaker 1: problems there. And that's to me the swings. I think
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  Speaker 1: Europe actually might surprise us to the upsides. Right now,
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  Speaker 1: I'm short term technically bullish. I think there's probably more
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  Speaker 1: upside than downside. And where I look at the economy heading, okay,
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  Speaker 1: so you think there's more upside than downside when it
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  Speaker 1: comes to US equities. What about high yield? You know,
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  Speaker 1: I think high yield's kind of played out. It's going
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  Speaker 1: to be a carry game at most um. Whether we
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  Speaker 1: will start seeing a few companies at trouble or not.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe I think that was more likely at the start
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  Speaker 1: of the year when all in yields were slightly higher.
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  Speaker 1: That's all in. Lower yields just helps all these companies
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  Speaker 1: risk assets are well and alive, you know, M and
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  Speaker 1: A activities there, so companies can sell off. I think
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  Speaker 1: it's going to be kind of a mean for high
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  Speaker 1: yield all right. And then the other question is, I mean,
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  Speaker 1: I think it's just going to be a bumpy road
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  Speaker 1: for a while. Does that mean that the prospect of
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  Speaker 1: a recession is pushed out substantially more uh than many
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  Speaker 1: are currently factoring in. Yes, I think it's pushed out. One.
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  Speaker 1: We now have this new reaction function from the Fed,
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  Speaker 1: so they're going to be overly aggressive trying to fend
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  Speaker 1: off a recession. And then I think people get a
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  Speaker 1: little bit too concerned. Remember Q four, Oh it's bad.
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  Speaker 1: Q one is gonna be a disaster, Q onet or not. Fine.
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  Speaker 1: I think Q two is gonna be weak, But part
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  Speaker 1: of the weakness is going to be all the trade
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  Speaker 1: war related fights, the tariffs. Some of that's going to
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  Speaker 1: go away in Q three and Q four. So I
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  Speaker 1: don't think we're going to see this kind of straight
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  Speaker 1: line down. And to me, Europe's the wild card. What's
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  Speaker 1: Laguar gonna do is you able to implement stimulus there
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  Speaker 1: then all of a sudden, you know again there's might
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  Speaker 1: be positive surprises from Europe which we haven't seen in years.
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  Speaker 1: One thing I'm struggling to understand is the efficacy of
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  Speaker 1: quantitative easing and of lowering rates at a time when
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  Speaker 1: borrowing costs are so low. I just I'm trying. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: there have been a number of academic studies that have
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  Speaker 1: come out showing that each additional round of quantitative easing
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  Speaker 1: and lowering rates from an already pretty low base doesn't
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  Speaker 1: really do all that much when it comes to juicing
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  Speaker 1: up the economy. So at what point do people care
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  Speaker 1: about that? Again? At some point I completely agree with
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  Speaker 1: you too, though I'm not sure that these policies are right.
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  Speaker 1: I hate the idea of negative yields. I think negative
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  Speaker 1: yields are disaster for banks. I think at some point
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  Speaker 1: twenty years from now, people are going to revise how
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  Speaker 1: they look at economics and say inflation actually targets to
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  Speaker 1: the Fed funds rather than vice versas. So all these
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  Speaker 1: cuts actually deep are deflationary over time. I think we're
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  Speaker 1: doing a lot of wrong things, but I've long since
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  Speaker 1: stopped trying to fight what I think is wrong and
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  Speaker 1: just accept what I think the FED and there are
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  Speaker 1: going to do and try and trade around that. So
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  Speaker 1: do you think that it's a good idea to go
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  Speaker 1: long US equities right now and also go a long,
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  Speaker 1: longer dated U S bonds. No, I actually don't like
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  Speaker 1: that trade here. I think that's been one of the
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  Speaker 1: trades I'm starting to do some more work on. And
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  Speaker 1: you know, what I've been looking at is what are
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  Speaker 1: the safe trades? What are the safe assets. So a
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  Speaker 1: lot of people are in these sixty forty type funds
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  Speaker 1: where you own equities and you own bonds. I really
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  Speaker 1: don't like that here. I think yields are low, stocks
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  Speaker 1: at all time high. I think we want to pay back.
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  Speaker 1: I've also been looking at some of these men Vall
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  Speaker 1: and low Ball equity targeted funds. They've had massive amounts
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  Speaker 1: of inflows. It feels to me like people are kind
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  Speaker 1: of reaching and saying, oh, I can invest in stocks,
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  Speaker 1: but they're safe stocks. I'm like, yeah, stocks aren't all safe,
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  Speaker 1: and when we have problems, they're all going to be hit.
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  Speaker 1: So that's kind of reluctant to I'd rather own equities here.
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  Speaker 1: Than bonds. I'd like to be short long dated bonds
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  Speaker 1: here short them. So you think that the olds are
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  Speaker 1: going to rise, I think in the tens and thirties
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  Speaker 1: are gonna go higher significantly or just a bit. Tend
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  Speaker 1: to thirty basis points, so you know, meaningful from here? Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I think we should be to to thirty five on
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  Speaker 1: the tenure treasury. Okay, just going forward, I'm trying to
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  Speaker 1: understand the picture in the key election year. What are
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  Speaker 1: you expecting in terms of what assets are expected to
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  Speaker 1: do the best at a time. If the Federal Reserve
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  Speaker 1: is supporting the markets with the reaction function as you
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  Speaker 1: describe it, uh, and if certainly the government is looking
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  Speaker 1: to bolster markets given the fact that President Trump would
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  Speaker 1: like to get reelected, what are you looking for? So,
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  Speaker 1: you know, we've talked about this before and it's kind
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  Speaker 1: of maybe a weird view what I say. You know,
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  Speaker 1: look at the TV show Survivor. Let's pretend Trump has
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  Speaker 1: an immunity doll. That immunity doll is a trade deal
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  Speaker 1: with China. Why use it now? Right? Use that close
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  Speaker 1: to the election. So I think we're gonna see a
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  Speaker 1: lot of hype about a trade deal Q one, Q
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  Speaker 1: two next year, and that's going to really bolster energy stocks,
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  Speaker 1: and I think tech interesting. So we're going to be
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  Speaker 1: listening in on J. Powell, the Federal Reserve Chair, speak
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  Speaker 1: in front of the House Committee, beginning of a two
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  Speaker 1: day testimony in front of Congress. UH, and we are
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  Speaker 1: going to hear from him. What are you expecting to
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  Speaker 1: hear from him today? I think a lot of what
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  Speaker 1: he wrote, he's going to focus on inflation, right. Everything
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  Speaker 1: else really doesn't justify why he wants to be so dovey.
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  Speaker 1: So I think this lack of inflation is gonna be
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  Speaker 1: something we hear over and over. Thanks for listening to
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