Together we’ve got this

Market participants are eagerly awaiting the Fed meeting in mid-December. How it chooses to tackle inflation will determine the severity of the recession, which our models – especially the Wave and the risk model – are now clearly signaling.

With Egypt’s Sharm el-Sheikh being the venue of this year’s United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP), it’s worth remembering that developing economies bear most of the negative effects of emissions mainly produced in industrialized nations. Therefore, the onus is on western companies to go “net zero carbon”, but how to measure their progress? One common yardstick for investors is the carbon footprint method – or the more encompassing “potential avoided emissions” method propagated by Vontobel’s impact investing team.

The bear market has not yet reached its end. Meanwhile, concerns are also rising that economic stagflation - an economic situation in which stagnant growth is accompanied by inflation - could develop. This view is shared not only by our proprietary business cycle model, whose contraction signals are strengthening, but also by the continuously rising credit spread, which has reached levels of past recessions this month.

Our models are signaling that not only the economy but also the risk environment is deteriorating further. Possible further interest rate hikes are weighing on both equity and bond markets, with no relief in sight at present.

Our models signal that we are still in troubled waters. Moreover, the data do not yet give the green light for a sustained economic recovery. The bear market therefore still has room to run.

Discussing sustainability matters with Chinese companies is rewarding and challenging. Part of it is fact-finding, part of it is education. But investors need to tread with caution, and little extras such as talking Chinese help, says Hong Kong-based ESG analyst Gayle Chan. She also explains the approach of mtx Equities, citing a concrete example.

In recent weeks, our in-house risk model has increasingly weighted the run-up to the financial crisis of 2007. This means that the model is finding more and more similarities with the financial market situation in this period. Can these parallels be interpreted as a prophecy or is everything different this time?

How can you find growth in times of panic? Difficult markets are not to be feared. Investors need an optimistic resolve and a clear roadmap: identify businesses with sustainable and predictable earnings streams, pricing power, and lower leverage, and avoid stocks trading at exorbitant multiples that are vulnerable to higher discount rates.

In 2021, Asian internet stocks, dragged down by Chinese blue chips, massively underperformed their US peers. But the valuation chasm between Asia and the US has narrowed of late. With Chinese regulators easing their grip, the country’s internet stocks may be bottoming out, which could be an opportunity for able stock pickers.