Market updates

The Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey, combined with financial results from the banks, is probably still the most useful tool we have for gauging the cycle’s life expectancy.

A number of threats to risk assets have dissipated and could become positive tail risks for markets moving into 2020.

"The European CLO market is much smaller, but given the US is further ahead in the economic cycle, the US market can provide a good indication of what might happen in Europe."

For us, it is the insight into the US economy and the strength or weakness of their customers, that we find most interesting in the banking results, and especially so when the US economic data is increasingly pointing to a slowdown.

The US-China interim agreement reduces recessionary risks in both countries. However, the trade war is far from over and risks of a re-escalation persist.

It is not clear to us just how much more monetary easing will placate equity investors, and we see a real risk that when we enter the third quarter earnings season next week, company specific data from the bottom up will be more of a shock than the macro picture has been.

"We think the downside to markets is still underappreciated, and thus we would prefer to stay long protection."

The active versus passive management debate is well documented, but with ESG or sustainable investing the debate takes on a new dimension.

The globally operating travel group Thomas Cook entered liquidation this week, after it was unable to reach an agreement between its shareholders, financiers and numerous creditors, leaving hundreds of thousands of travellers stranded. A potential restructuring would likely have resulted in a significant loss for bondholders, but now it looks like the senior unsecured bonds are virtually worthless – Debtwire expects a recovery of 0-10% and the bonds are now trading at around 6 cents.

There has been a bit of nervousness to say the least in US money markets over the last few days. The overnight repo rate in dollars surged to levels not seen since the aftermath of the financial crisis, touching almost 10% on Tuesday. During the financial crisis the high dollar repo rates were a clear sign of trouble in the banking system, so it’s natural that investors might be uneasy about this. We should stress upfront that this is not the case today, the spike in the repo rate is a short term technicality created by a confluence of events, none of which should be worrisome, but in which in aggregate created a shortage of dollar cash in a short space of time and over a very short period.

At TwentyFour we regard ‘momentum’ as one of the most underestimated factors in promoting progress on environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues. Our view is capital markets should support rather than shun a company if it has a credible plan to improve in a key area or areas.

Alongside the usual unveilings at the Frankfurt Motor Show this week, one bit of automotive news that piqued our interest yesterday was Moody’s downgrading Ford to “junk” status, assigning a Ba1 rating to the company’s debt with a stable outlook.