For us here in the UK, the main topics for discussion this week are unsurprisingly, yet again, another announcement from Trump on tariffs and his so-called Liberation Day next week (2nd April). We also had the Budget here in the UK which has attracted much criticism even from within the Labour party.
Trump has a habit of being able to move markets with messages on social media which doesn’t help investor confidence. Interestingly, some commodity trading houses are supposedly thinking of changing their working hours here in Europe to coincide with US market trading hours so they can react to the plethora of announcements. Whilst this doesn’t impact our readers directly, it just goes to show how quickly sentiment is changing causing trigger-happy responses.
The concern about tariffs is that whilst they may, over the medium-term, stimulate internal growth, elevated prices could lead to increased inflation and in the short-term lead to a weaker economy. Analysts are pouring over data in case the numbers indicate that the US is slipping towards a recession.
The tariff war rolls on and the latest volley from Trump is to impose a 25% import levy on all cars. One thing is for sure, there will be more announcements to come. We cannot ignore the counter-response from countries across the globe when looking at markets. Selected countries are seeking to retaliate with tariffs of their own. This all seems a long way removed from the globalisation approach of a few years back!
With regards to the Budget, although Rachel Reeves set out to reassure the country with comments about stability and responsibility, her focus on fiscal discipline at the expense of visionary strategies left many doubting that she can deliver growth for the UK economy.
In this issue, I thought it would also be worth giving some perspective, amidst all the uncertainty, as to how resilient trade can be in times of duress.
On this week’s agenda:
- Traders may change their working hours
- Car tariff announcement rocks markets
- Attractions elsewhere
- BlackRock favourable towards US stocks
- The UK Budget
- German business optimism rises more than expected
- Trade finds a way
- Summary
Traders may change their working hours
This week it was muted in a semi-serious way that traders in Europe may consider changing their working hours to resonate with that of the US, as markets are moving around so much.
Commodity traders particularly are concerned as to how Trump’s frequent posts have sparked huge volatility in commodity markets, with many traders scrambling to keep up with the news flow.
A Bloomberg article highlighted Richard Holtum’s thoughts, Trafigura’s newly appointed Chief Executive, when he said he was “semi-seriously” considering changing traders’ working hours in Geneva to 2pm to midnight. “The European hours are pretty quiet in the morning these days,” he said, at the FT Commodities Global Summit in Lausanne. “You just wait for President Trump to wake up and decide how your day is going to go.”
Continues…
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