After hiking for the fourth consecutive month, the RBA's tone has shifted to suggest a pause at the September meeting is possible, reflecting in part the troubling signals emanating from markets as the US teeters on the brink of recession and conditions continue to cool across the globe. 

As lead indicators continue to flash red - consumer confidence remains at alarming levels and housing is rolling over - can Australia's central bank successfully thread the needle and avoid an outright stalling of the Australian economy? 

Speakers: 
Darren Langer, Co-Head of Australian Fixed Income &
Chris Rands, Senior Portfolio Manager

Interest rate hikes, inflation, geopolitical tension… Portfolio Manager Anshu Sharma discusses semiconductors (chips) and why we think they are so important over the next three to five years.

In this video insight, Roger discusses how the fate of equity markets now hinges materially, but not solely, on the employment picture and the how central banks navigate the very serious choice they have to make between inflation or recession.

Transcript 

Roger Montgomery:

Immigration. It's the most convenient solution to the wage pressure now being felt across the developed world, the pressure that could entrench inflation through a wage/price spiral.  You may have noticed, hoped-for immigration is not ramping up. From the UK, to the US, New Zealand and here, the world is awash with jobs and nobody to fill them. Consequently, business are forced to pay more, workers and unions are demanding more, and already high supply-led inflation justifies the demands for growth in real wages. 

So, what happened?

Well, you might remember during the worst part of the COVID pandemic, Australia was one of many countries that offered fiscal support to those out of work or underemployed. Here in Australia it was JobKeeper that kept the economy humming. Temporary visa holders however, including international students, and casual workers who hadn't been employed for 12 months were notably excluded from the program.

More than a million people in Australia were on temporary visas and they were excluded from the government's support payments; that's about 500,000 international students, 140,000 working holidaymakers, 120,000 skilled temporary entrants, 200,000 bridging visa holders (who were largely partner visa applicants or asylum seekers), and more than 16,000 temporary protection visa holders (commonly referred to refugees).

In the absence of support many simply went home and many of those may not want to return. Meanwhile, those that do want to return, or visit for the first time, face egregious airfares thank to limited airline capacity and international air travel operating at about 40 per cent of pre-pandemic levels.

The longer the situation persists the sooner inflation ceases being solely a supply chain issue­ - out of the control of central banks ­- to a more endemic demand-led issue central banks will be forced to act on more harshly to control.

The fate of equity markets now hinges materially, but not solely, on the employment picture and the how central banks navigate the very serious choice they have to make between inflation or recession.

The US Federal Reserve is very focused on inflation which is currently at 8.6 per cent. Just recently, The Federal Reserve's Chairman Jerome Powell said it will not let the economy slip into a "higher inflation regime" even if that means raising interest rates to levels that put growth at risk.

The U.S. central bank has moved to a do-whatever-it-takes approach with Powell saying "The clock is kind of running on how long will you remain in a low-inflation regime … The risk is that because of the multiplicity of shocks you start to transition into a higher inflation regime, and our job is to literally prevent that from happening and we will prevent that from happening".

Thanks to that very tight labour market, demand remains strong and supply chains cannot cope. Consequently, what was previously thought of as being transitory inflation, is becoming entrenched. Higher wage demands come next and following that…a wage price spiral. A slowing economy is necessary to bring down demand, and a recession, in particular for the US and Europe, may be unavoidable as the US central bank leans towards killing inflation at all costs.

Meanwhile the liquidity that was injected into the financial system and economy during the pandemic is being withdrawn. US QT 'officially' started in June, but the 'effective' global balance sheet has already shrunk by US$1 trillion since December 2021. In such an environment - money literally being sucked out of markets - it is difficult for asset prices to rise materially or sustainably.

And none of that addresses heightened geopolitical risk or a potentially collapsing Chinese economy.

Great returns come from buying at low prices and I have presented widely elsewhere on the blog about the arithmetic of investing in growth amid compressed PEs. It may just be that even lower prices are possible.

Speaker:  Roger Montgomery, Chairman and Chief Investment Officer

Tech stocks have borne the brunt of the recent sell off in equity markets and with the Nasdaq firmly in bear market territory, it is unprofitable tech stocks that have been hit the hardest - down almost 60% this year.

But amid these sell offs, there can be category leaders that fall to attractive valuations, relative to their long-term growth profile. Seagate Technology (NASDAQ: STX) is an example of this today. It's a beneficiary on the ongoing trend around data moving to the cloud as our lives become increasingly connected, and it's priced at just 8x next year's earnings. 

In this episode, Alison Savas hosts a deep dive into the company.

Part one (2:20): Alison interviews Seagate Technology Executive Vice President and CFO, Gianluca Romano. 
Part two (22.00): Alison is joined by Graham Hay (Antipodes Portfolio Manager of Hardware, Industrials and Commodities) to discuss the Seagate investment case.

Antipodes has owned Meta (previously Facebook) since the end of 2018 and despite the recent volatility in which many sold out of the company, it remains one of our top 20 holdings. 

We think that even though competition for eyeballs is increasing, and will continue to increase, the digital advertising pie is growing, and Meta can continue to dominate advertising revenue over our investment horizon. Further we believe there are opportunities to increase the monetisation rate of core Facebook and Instagram.  

In this new podcast episode, Alison Savas is joined by Ben Legg, one of the world's leading authorities on the digital advertising industry. Ben is a former Google COO, and now helps global brands advertise on social networks.  

Some key points covered include:

• Overview of how online advertise works today (04:00)
• The digital advertising landscape and why digital advertising as a percentage of GDP is likely to grow (07:30)
• The rise of Tik Tok (10:50)
• Meta's advertising technology and why it's seen as being superior to competitors (12:00)
• How Meta is moving to maintain user engagement (21:10) 
• Can Instagram become the world's biggest fashion retailer? (28.30)

Leaders indicators warn of global recession

Central banks state they are not seeing signs of a recession as they continue hiking rates to curb spiralling inflation. But with forward indicators flashing red across the board, low consumer confidence, declining forward sales, the US yield curve beginning to invert, and the continued drop in the global equities, markets are telling us they see slowing growth ahead.

Will the RBA pause in August, or will they continue to tighten at the fastest rate we have seen in 30 years and drive the country into a recession?

Speakers: 
Darren Langer, Co-Head of Australian Fixed Income &
Chris Rands, Senior Portfolio Manager

Speakers:

Gerald Stack, Head of Infrastructure
David Costello, Portfolio Manager
Ofer Karliner, Portfolio Manager
Ben McVicar, Portfolio Manager
Jowell Amores, Portfolio Manager

Time stamps:
22.00 Infrastructure review by sector
45.00 Impact of inflation and interest rates
48.15 Opportunities and risks from the energy transition
58.46 Safe transition methodology
1.00.00  Conclusion
1.04.00  Q&A