THE LIQUIDITY PUNCH BOWL
It is appropriate with the inauguration of this weekly column to look at the “Big Picture”. The biggest risk to world stock markets, and asset prices in general, in 2018 is that G7 central banks (led by the Federal Reserve) are finally attempting to normalise monetary policy nine years after the American central bank commenced quantitative easing in December 2008, in the midst of the so-called “global financial crisis”.
Since late 2008, G7 central banks, comprising the Fed, the Bank of Japan, the European Central Bank and the Bank of England, have committed to massive balance sheet expansion (through the purchase of mortgage and government debt). Their balance sheets continued to rise in aggregate during 2017 even though the Fed itself stopped expanding its own balance sheet in November 2014. Aggregate assets of G7 central banks increased by 17.2% last year to $15.2tn at the end of 2017, up from US$4.3tn at the beginning of 2008 (see following chart).
Sources: Bloomberg, Federal Reserve, Bank of England, ECB, Bank of Japan, CEIC Data, CLSA
That the Fed has commenced balance sheet reduction from last October is a risk for stock markets since it amounts to another form of monetary tightening, in addition to interest rate hikes. That it has not yet caused market fallout reflects two factors:
- The Fed is beginning extremely tentatively by decreasing its reinvestment of principal payments from maturing bonds.
- Other G7 central banks are still expanding in aggregate, albeit at a slower pace. This is why there will be much focus on what the European Central Bank will do in coming months. For now, it looks like G7 central bank balance sheets will start to contract in aggregate in 2019 rather than 2018.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
