The fundamental backdrop for growth has improved with healing from the financial
crisis and relative calm on the fiscal front.
• After a wobbly start to the New Year, the data now point to steady 3% or so GDP
growth and an even stronger recovery in the labor market.
• Inflation will likely remain weaker than both Fed and consensus forecasts, however,
the Fed seem willing to blame the weakness on temporary factors and focus on
upside pressure from a tightening labor market.
• There has been a regime shift at the Fed. Until 2013 the Fed was resolutely focused
in healing the economy and avoiding a “Japan Scenario.” With healing well
advanced, however, now they have shifted to “data dependent” mode. The Fed’s
“bias” is to act, all it needs is confirmation in the data.
• Three scenarios seem plausible for the Fed: our base case is that markets stabilize
and the Fed hikes this month, the second most likely scenario is that the Fed
remains uncomfortable with market fragility and delays hiking until October or
December; and the least likely scenario is that shocks to the economy worsen,
damaging growth and turning a temporary delay into a semi-permanent delay.
• What happens after the hike? We continue to expect rate hikes at every other
meeting, or at less than half the usual pace. Moreover, the risk is that that they
start out even slower, hiking every third meeting. We will revisit this question as
the Fed focus shifts and they drop more hints about the pace of hiking.
What does all this imply for capital markets?
• As this goes to press, a September move is only partially priced in. However, the
first hike will likely be seen by many as a “policy mistake” limiting pressure on the
rates market. The bigger shock will come if the Fed follows through with a
sequence of hikes.
• Rate hikes will not come as a big surprise to the currency market, but our work
suggests that the sharp move higher in the dollar in the last year was mainly due to
growth concerns and easings by other central banks. With Fed hikes not fully priced
in, we expect modest further upward