After the fastest bear market ever, we’ve had one of the fastest rebounds. So, is the rally done for now?

The DNA team present an anatomy of a potential inflation paradigm shift, a checklist of confirmatory signals, and the portfolio moves investors could consider.

Will COVID-19 and its associated bear market interrupt the move towards RI? While a cynic would say yes, we disagree for three reasons: ESG performance, no bubble and structural drivers.

We try to answer five questions to bring order to the chaos, including: what have markets priced in?; is the policy response adequate?; and will it get worse before it gets better?

We use the composite market timing indicator to illustrate that the basic conditions for buying equities look favourable, in our view.

Is there more to come from equity markets following both the political and economic environment growing more benign?

Why Boris Johnson’s UK election victory is positive for GBP and UK equities, and negative for gilts.

Boris Johnson for the win, sterling up and cake for everyone? What could be the market implications of our election analysis?

We believe it is not a contradiction to be a capitalist and focus on ESG at the same time.

Why we remain positive on equity and credit risk, and negative on bond duration.

Everyone loves a golden rule. Is 'sell equity when the 10-2 curve inverts' one of them?

We look at five critical market debates – about growth, rates, equities, trade wars and Quality versus Value – and what that means for where we are in the current economic cycle.

Compelling valuation, encouraging signs at corporates, and supportive domestic and global trends – reasons why we’re positive on Japan.

Two new possible policy initiatives risk unmooring inflation expectations, changing our inflation regime from Reflation to Inflation.

The main story in the first quarter was the pivot from hawkish to dovish. What does this mean for growth?

If we’d known at the start of 2018 what we know now, would we have expected to end the year where we did?

What makes free cash flow an effective metric?

The structural problems and value opportunities in a beleaguered market.

What is happening to productivity growth?

Examining how risk assets would fare in our Fire and Ice regime.

What happens during a bubble?

The last 20 years have seen negative correlations between stock and bond prices. This is against the precedent of history: for the preceding 250 years the correlation was consistently positive.

The DNA team present an anatomy of a potential inflation paradigm shift, a checklist of confirmatory signals, and the portfolio moves investors could consider.

A combination of the US election, a slowing second derivative of growth, slight tightening in financial conditions and, of course, the blasted virus are reasons why we believe investors should wait patiently before adding risk.

A common Covid response to the virus has been to invoke the legacy of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt. We dig into that dramatic period of economic history to see what specific actions FDR took to break free from the secular stagnation of his time.

Are aging populations disinflationary? Lots of people seem to think yes, but we’re less convinced.

Could the policy response to the coronacrisis lead the world into a permanently more inflationary setting? Ben Funnell and Teun Draaisma discuss their thinking.

The current extremes in deflation, inequality and debt mean the conditions are right for several major investment regime shifts in the next decade. Ben Funnell and Teun Draaisma discuss these potentially dramatic changes in the investment landscape; from paper to real assets, Growth to Value, and traditional assets to alternatives.

How should investors reposition their portfolios in the face of heightened inflation risk?

How should investors reposition their portfolios in the face of heightened inflation risk? Ben Funnell presents findings from his most recent academic paper at the Unconventional Quant Summit 2021.

In this video, portfolio manager Ben Funnell talks through the key findings from the recently published ‘The Best Strategies for Inflationary Times’ academic paper.

In terms of the political narrative, the wicket is as flat as it’s been in decades for the Keynesians (assuming they’re batting).

At which point do rising rates and inflation start becoming a problem for equity markets?

Analysis shows it pays to own oil, gold and wine, and possibly also a bitcoin if and when inflation bites.

Precedent suggests that policy dominates outcomes, and policy is now pro-inflation, especially in the US.

We go through our quantitative framework for monitoring the possibility of inflation regime change. Of our 10 traffic lights, the scorecard is currently five red, two amber, three green.

Investors currently face the challenge of having little experience and no recent data to guide the repositioning of their portfolios in the face of heighted inflation risk. We provide some insight.

An ex-central banker, three academic professors and seven finance practitioners get together to discuss inflation: its relationship to unemployment, how people form expectations about it, and most importantly, whether it’s transitory or permanent.

Over the long term, we consider it likely that US 10-year sovereigns will lose buyers’ money in real terms. However, over the shorter term, models are suggesting that rates could stay low for longer, albeit they may move slightly higher from here.

Could Crypto be a useful diversifier in a multi-asset portfolio? And what might be an optimal allocation if so?

Wage pressures and stock-bond correlations support the premise of higher and more volatile inflation in 2022. The complicating factor is that the large base effects from 2021 could mean some mechanical rollover in inflation. For us, this will be a head fake.

We describe the key steps to reshaping portfolios in a high and rising inflation regime, as well as investigating some of the characteristics behind a low and falling inflation one.

Does the flattening yield curve mean we need to curb our enthusiasm?; clean energy stocks are now selling cheap; and will the Quality comeback continue?

Are we out of the frying pan and into the fire when it comes to US inflation?; is financial repression here to stay?; and has this year’s volatility created a stock picker’s market?

The risk-reward is not yet favourable enough to step in and buy equities in size; and are rate hikes still the best course of action?

How can investors defend against rising inflation? And will the crisis in Ukraine prompt an accelerated renewable transition?

Contrarian alert! While market commentary is focused on ever-rising inflation, history shows that higher inflation also means higher inflation volatility - providing some surprising opportunities.

Ben Funnell, Teun Draaisma and Henry Neville look through a more structural lens to discuss the dynamics that may lead to secular stagnation breaking down over a multi-year, and even multi-decade, timeframe.

We have not been able to find systematic alpha in ESG data for sovereigns so far. However, for a discretionary fund manager, ESG data analysis is a potential rich area for idiosyncratic alpha.

Three spontaneous and unrelated market musings: the overvaluation of the pound, how an inflation rollover doesn’t mean the end of an inflationary cycle and importance of free cash flow.

What is the validity of recommendations made not in notes from sell-side equity research, but in the financial pages of the UK’s broadsheet and tabloid newspapers?

Today, many corporates and investors are wondering whether recent spikes in pecuniary wages are indicative of death to their margins and returns, respectively. Many individuals are also working out how to negotiate their next pay rise in this same frenetic environment. I try to bring clarity to all parties.