Jupiter

In the 1990s, the role of independent central banks was to act as global policemen stamping down on inflation whenever it flared up. But following the Great Financial Crisis the referees became players while in 2021 the boundary between independent central banks and their governments will look increasingly blurred. What sort of a world are bondholders likely to face, ask Ariel Bezalel and Harry Richards.

Looking to 2021 and considering the lasting impact of Covid-19, the mountains of debt left in its wake and how stock and bond investors have differing views. Through it all, long-term investors, commensurate with their risk appetite, are best served with a diversified portfolio.

The UK’s finances are a mess and, as the Chancellor himself has said, our economic emergency has just begun. The only two ways to address this are by the government taxing more and/or spending less – so how might they achieve it?

Milton Friedman used to say that “nothing is so permanent as a temporary government programme” and the last twelve years of ultra-low interest rates and quantitative easing (QE) undoubtedly fits the bill. 

“A great day for humanity” exclaimed the banner headline in the Daily Telegraph the morning after Pfizer and BioNTech had announced the successful trial results of their jointly developed Covid-19 vaccine. As last week’s narrative of the US election quickly gives way to the virus again, many see a solution that cannot come too quickly. 

Mark Heslop, Richard Watts, Brinton Johns and Guy de Blonay discuss how Covid-19 has accelerated existing trends and how this ‘double disruption’ shapes the way they assess investment opportunities and risks.

‘It’s outrageous’ protested a young Democrat voter on Radio 4 on Wednesday, ‘that so many people have voted against us!’. That’s democracy for you. As the cliff-hanger US election staggers towards an outcome with Biden as President (pending Trump’s legal challenges), the Democrats retaining the House but with a reduced majority and the Republicans perhaps just retaining the Senate, both sides must be ruing what might have been. 

Ariel Bezalel, Head of Strategy, Fixed Income, explains the appeal of a global flexible bond strategy, sharing his views on the macro environment and the corporate credit and government bond markets.

Early indications are that the US election is too close to call. Trump has again outperformed most forecasts, but with many states still counting ballots – and the likelihood of legal challenges to come from either campaign – Biden is still very much in the race although the final result may not be known for some time.

After one of the most dramatic and anticipated electoral events in modern history, the American people have voted, and the race for the White House is close. Trump has performed better than forecast, but the result remains in the balance. Jupiter fund managers including Ariel Bezalel, Richard Buxton, Ned Naylor-Leyland and Abbie Llewellyn-Waters, among others, offer their immediate thoughts on the implications for their asset classes.

Amid all the news of Covid-19 second waves, particularly across Europe, investment markets remain relatively calm despite predictions of shrinking global economic growth.

“I’ll highlight one area to start off with, and that’s biodiversity, it’s a very difficult subject for capital markets to understand; how do we value our biodiversity? It’s incredibly important, we all know that from a planetary perspective, but how do we value it? And how do we think of it from an investment perspective?” Jupiter’s Head of Sustainable Solutions, Charlie Thomas, talks about being a veteran in the sustainable investing space as it grows more popular, discusses what’s important to him when he makes investment decisions, and gives us his insight in to what he thinks will be the trends of the future.

Covid continues to make waves and the news remains dominated by it. Economic recovery depends on the ability, the propensity and the inclination of people to return to work and resume normal patterns of consumption. Underpinning all is that word ‘confidence’.

Clean energy and other sustainable solutions will be key to a reinvigorated post-COVID economy. This time, unlike after the Global Financial Crisis, politicians show little sign of backtracking on sustainability, believes Charlie Thomas.

Ariel Bezalel and Harry Richards explain why deflationary forces still hold sway in the global economy and where they’re finding opportunities in the Jupiter Strategic Bond Fund.

With the prevalence of Covid-19 and its rapid and significant disruption to the global economy, not surprisingly the tectonic plates on which central banks sit are gradually shifting as countries deploy their own different strategies to deal with the fall-out. This week, the Bank of England and the US Federal Reserve (Fed) held their respective September meetings, and both warmed to themes aired publicly at the recent Jackson Hole policy symposium and before that.

The one fifth decline in UK GDP in the second quarter could, without any fear of exaggeration or hyperbole, be described literally as ‘unprecedented’. Now confirming what we have been seeing for several weeks in improving unofficial high frequency data (credit card usage, retail footfalls, traffic congestion, passenger movements, electricity consumption etc), UK GDP saw a recovery of 6.6% in July.

Are governments and central banks trying to cure a debt problem with more debt? As policy intervention drives markets higher at the same time as economic data nosedives, Ariel Bezalel and Harry Richards discuss where they are finding opportunities and avoiding pitfalls in today’s bond markets.