Making lemonade out of macro lemons

THE investing landscape has fundamentally changed. Some investors may be waiting, or hoping, for a return of the sustained bull markets in both equities and bonds that we enjoyed for the 40 years before the pandemic. But I think we are in a new regime, and we are not going back any time soon. It’s time to stop waiting and start making lemonade from the lemons that the macro environment presents. This is going to take a more nimble approach than it did in the past.

One reason: the economic outlook is much more uncertain. In the US, market narratives have been swinging between hopes for a soft landing and recession fears through 2023. But context is everything. Despite seemingly strong economic activity recently, the US economy has grown more slowly over the past three years than was typical before the pandemic. There is no landing – we are just climbing out of a hole.

There is a natural tendency to interpret inflation and growth as though we are in a typical business cycle but we are not. As the global economy normalises from the pandemic, it is being shaped by new forces such as ageing populations, geopolitical fragmentation and the low-carbon transition. We’re in the midst of a massive structural shift that is likely to see major economies move on to lower growth paths amid persistent production constraints. The resulting disconnect between the cyclical narrative and structural reality is stoking market volatility.