Al centro di tutto (parte 2)

Il tema della crescita, ovvero della mancanza di crescita, sta al centro di tutto: lo abbiamo scritto nel Post che precede questo. Ma proprio alla luce di questo tema, quali saranno le prossime mosse delle Banche Centrali ora che il QE ha fallito? Recce'd ve ne ha scritto il 16 agosto, oggi invece, a distanza di sette giorni, ne scrive il Financial Times con le parole che vi riportiamo sotto:

This is another of those weeks when markets hang on every word from Janet Yellen, the Federal Reserve chair, who is speaking in Jackson Hole on Friday. Such is the over-analysis of Fedspeak, they hang on every comma and colon too.

But if all investors are listening for from the annual central bankers’ symposium is clues as to whether the Fed raises rates in September, December or 2017, they may miss more important information for the coming year.

A central question is whether the developed world, and the US in particular, is finally about to see an uptick in inflation, which has been subdued for so long since the financial crisis. Getting the right answer to that question could be key to investing success. Smart money investors in the US are already drawing up strategies for a higher-inflation world, and it never hurts to have a few trading ideas in the hopper ready to go.

Ms Yellen’s colleague John Williams, president of the San Francisco Fed, has thrown the idea of raising central banks’ inflation target into the mix of suggestions for making monetary policy more flexible. Further remedies for sluggish economic growth will also be on policymakers’ minds.

Investors listening in on these wonkish discussions may decide that central bankers have some new ideas for rekindling inflation. But there are other reasons to think consumer prices might revive. Average hourly earnings in the US grew at an annual rate of 2.6 per cent last month, and the fact that job growth has outpaced labour force growth suggests upward pressure to come.

Meanwhile politicians around the world seem more willing to use fiscal policy after years of austerity, notably in the UK and Japan but also in the US, where bothpresidential candidates are talking infrastructure spending.

For years inflation has been the dog that did not bark, and no one is expecting a return to the 1970s. But it may be time to examine potential investment strategies for a no-longer-rock-bottom-inflation world.

This is harder than it sounds. After years of quantitative easing, real assets are trading at elevated prices. Gold, that most traditional inflation hedge, may be too volatile for many investors in the age of exchange traded funds.

However, three broad strategies suggest themselves, one in the bond market and two in equities.

E qui ci fermiamo: perché il FT propone le sue strategie, ma noi abbiamo già le nostre, che fino ad oggi sono vincenti e adeguate a questa sfida.