FICC
| Currencies
Near-term trades and longer-term views on every major developed and emerging market currency.
MoF FX intervention has drawn a line at 160, triggering a sharp yen squeeze. But with near-term fundamentals still stacked against the currency, USD/JPY remains poised to retest the highs before any durable turn.
Central banks remain on hold amid heightened uncertainty. We rely on BCA’s Central Bank Monitors to assess the current policy stance of major central banks, and highlight the tactical opportunities across bond markets and currencies.
The dollar’s pullback masks a quiet improvement in its cyclical backdrop, with growth, monetary policy, and flows turning in its favor. As markets fully price out geopolitical risk, the USD should decouple from oil and better reflect these gains, despite lingering structural headwinds.
We are pleased to introduce our new Quarterly Investment Outlook, a joint publication bringing together the European Investment Strategy (EIS), Global Fixed Income Strategy (GFIS), and Foreign Exchange Strategy teams. The main takeaway of the current edition is that investors should not add risk. Markets are still focused on inflation, but the binding constraint is growth: if the energy shock persists into mid-April, a rapid shift toward recession pricing will follow.
We discuss the takeaways from this week’s central bank meetings amidst the unfolding energy price shock.
The Iran war remains a terms-of-trade shock rather than a classic flight to safety – for now. As oil risks skew higher, policy repricing and growth differentials should continue to favor a tactical rebound in the USD.
Policy risks are set to fade just as markets underestimate hawkish Fed repricing and crowd into short-USD positions, setting the stage for a tactical dollar rebound into the election cycle. Go long USD/CHF to capture the rate differential and receding policy uncertainty.