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Financial markets party as global trade wars begin

Financial Events
By Paul Hodges on 03-Jun-2018

More people left poverty in the past 70 years than in the whole of history, thanks to the BabyBoomer-led economic SuperCycle.  World Bank and OECD data show that less than 10% of the world’s population now live below the extreme poverty line of $1.90/day, compared to 55% in 1950.

Globalisation has been a key element in enabling this progress, as countries and regions began to trade with each other.  But now global trade is starting to decline, as the chart from the authoritative Dutch World Trade Monitor shows:

  • After a good start to 2018, February saw trade fall 0.7% in February and 1.2% in March
  • The major slowdown was in Asia, particularly China, as its lending began to slow

And then on Friday, President Trump confirmed the opening of his long-planned trade wars:

  • He imposed 25% import tariffs on steel and 10% on aluminium from Canada, Mexico and the European Union
  • Similar tariffs were already in place on imports from China, Russia and other countries
  • America’s longest standing allies have since imposed their own sanctions in retaliation
  • The stage is now set for a developing global trade war as more countries join in

PRESIDENT TRUMP IS IMPLEMENTING THE POLICIES ON WHICH HE WAS ELECTED
None of this should have been a surprise, as it simply follows the agenda that President Trump set out in his Gettysburg speech just before the election.  His policy proposals then, which I featured here in depth in January 2017, were crystal clear about his objectives, as the slide shows:

  • Those policies marked in red are now being introduced
  • Only 2 of them – around China being a currency manipulator, and infrastructure – are still to be delivered
  • Yet companies, commentators and analysts have preferred to ignore the obvious

It was clear then, and is even clearer today, that Trump intends to abandon the policies followed by all post-War Republican and Democratic presidents including Eisenhower, Reagan and Clinton, and summarised in President Kennedy’s 1961 Inauguration Speech:

“To those old allies whose cultural and spiritual origins we share, we pledge the loyalty of faithful friends. United there is little we cannot do in a host of cooperative ventures. Divided there is little we can do–for we dare not meet a powerful challenge at odds and split asunder.”

As I noted after Trump’s own Inauguration Speech in January last year, he broke very explicitly with these policies:

“We assembled here today are issuing a new decree to be heard in every city in every foreign capital and in every hall of power. From this day forward, a new vision will govern our land. From this day forward, it’s going to be only America first, America first. Every decision on trade, on taxes, on immigration, on foreign affairs will be made to benefit American workers and American families.”

BAD NEWS HAS ALWAYS LED TO MORE STIMULUS IN THE PAST

Unsurprisingly, financial markets have chosen to ignore this rise in protectionism.  For them, bad news is always good news, as they expect the central banks to provide more stimulus via their money-printing policies.  As the left-hand chart shows of Prof Robert Shiller’s CAPE Index (Cyclically Adjusted Price/Earnings ratio) since 1881:

  • When Trump took office, the ratio was already at 28.5 – above the 1901 and 1966 peaks
  • Since then it has peaked at 33.3, above the 1929 peak
  • Only 2000 was higher at 44, when the end of the SuperCycle coincided with the Fed’s first liquidity programme to prevent any problems with the Y2K issue

The right-hand chart confirms the bubble nature of the rally:

  • It compares S&P 500 developments with the level of margin debt in the New York Stock Exchange
  • Until 1985, the Fed operated on the principle of “taking away the punchbowl as the party gets going
  • Since then, it has increasingly believed, as then Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said in November 2010

“Higher stock prices will boost consumer wealth and help increase confidence, which can also spur spending. Increased spending will lead to higher incomes and profits that, in a virtuous circle, will further support economic expansion.

As a result, the S&P 500 has risen along with margin debt, which peaked at $659bn in January ($2018).

FINANCIAL MARKETS HAVE AN UNPLEASANT “SURPRISE” AHEAD AS CHINA SLOWS
It is therefore no great surprise that financial markets have continued to ignore developments in the real world.

Yet a decline in world trade, and the rise in protectionism, will inevitably produce Winners and Losers.  This will be quite different from the SuperCycle, when the rise of globalisation created “win-win opportunities” for countries and regions:

  • Essentially the deal was that consumers in richer countries got cheaper, well-made, products
  • People in poorer countries gained paid employment for the first time in history by making these products

History also suggests President Trump will be proved wrong with his March suggestion that:  “Trade wars are good and easy to win”.  Like all wars, they are easy to start and increasingly difficult to end.

So far, financial markets have ignored these uncomfortable facts.  They still believe that any bad news will lead to even more central bank stimulus, and a further rise in margin debt.

But as I noted last week, China – not the Fed – was in fact the major source of stimulus lending.  Now its lending bubble is history, the party in financial markets is inevitably entering its end-game.