Author: Michael Crowley

Trump’s tariff retreat

There’s some relief in markets as Donald Trump backs down from his threat to impose tariffs on 1st February after he said he had agreed ‘a framework for a future deal with respect to Greenland’ with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, though there are few details available regarding what this entails (should we be surprised?). […]

Weak US markets

US stocks, bonds and the dollar all fell yesterday in response to Trump’s latest tariff threat (US markets were closed Monday), a mini rerun of the ‘sell America’ trade that followed his infamous reciprocal tariffs announcement last April, though some of the fall in bond prices (rise in bond yields) probably reflected a spillover from […]

Global Watch January 2026

The US economy has held up better than expected though employment growth has slowed and unemployment has edged up, prompting the Fed to lower interest rates over the final months of last year. We expect it to cut by a further 50bps in 2026, in line with current market pricing. We also see the Bank […]

Dollar on the back foot

The dollar remains on the back foot post Trump’s latest tariff threat, weakening somewhat further in overnight trading. The euro and sterling have extended their gains against the US currency, to around $1.17 and $1.3480 respectively, both now up around 1% from Friday’s closing levels. Positive news out of France, where it looks like a […]

Another cat among the pigeons

Markets are digesting Donald Trump’s weekend threat to impose a 10% tariff on eight NATO allies (six EU countries and two non-EU countries) involved in the deployment of a small number of military personnel to Greenland at the end of last week – which he says poses a risk to ‘global peace and security’ – rising […]

Dollar still on the front foot

The dollar was on the front foot again yesterday supported by rising US bond yields, which in turn was driven by solid US labour market data (the number of new jobless claimants fell by more than expected last week) and some relatively hawkish ‘Fedspeak’. EURUSD is trading at around $1.1610 this morning, having briefly dipped […]

Quiet enough in FX

It was quiet enough in FX yesterday, even as equity markets were under pressure and bond yields headed lower, although the yen recovered some ground amid a warning of possible intervention to support the currency. The dollar is slightly firmer overnight, as Donald Trump tells Reuters he has no plans to fire Jerome Powell (despite […]

Dollar slightly firmer

While there was some volatility immediately following the release of yesterday’s inflation data in the US, the main currency pairs are really not much changed from yesterday morning’s levels albeit with a slightly firmer tone to the dollar. EURUSD and GBPUSD are trading at about $1.1650 and $1.3450 respectively this morning (both also largely unchanged […]

Inflation data in the US today

There was very little reaction in markets to Jerome Powell’s criticism of threats to the Fed’s independence. Markets are similarly shrugging off Donald Trump’s announcement of a 25% tariff on any country ‘doing business’ with Iran (indeed this may reduce the chances of US military action), though China not surprisingly has criticised the decision. In […]

Dollar lower following Powell missive

While Friday’s jobs report in the US was something of a mixed bag – the economy added fewer jobs than expected in December but the unemployment rate edged down – the market pared back expectations for Fed rate cuts slightly following the data, helping the dollar extend its gains at the end of the week. […]