The Market Call

Jeremy and Gareth discuss the week's macro market news and developments, comparing the plight of the Trump and Starmer administrations, which are six months and a year in, respectively. The differing outcomes, at least in part, reflect the degree to which the bond markets constrain the UK government more than the US. We are halfway through 2025 and have had a turbulent Q2. Equity markets are recov...

WW3 is over, oil prices are plummeting, inflation is dead, Daddy Trump is putting the world back together, including doing a trade deal with China and getting interest rates down, even if it means sacking the man who is in his way. And the UK smaller company sector has discovered the Bitcoin magic money tree and is bathing in the prospect of free money. What a time to be alive! What could possibly...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth discuss the market reaction to Trump's potential intervention in the Israel-Iran conflict, as well as interest-rate "holds" from the US and UK in the face of ongoing inflationary pressure.  Japan continues to confuse - and to present major risk - with high inflation and close-to-zero interest rates, while the US/Japan trade deal is still conspicuous by its absence.   ...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth talk about the dramatic overnight events in Iran, as Israel's actions have led to spikes in the prices of oil and gold, but not driven the usual "flight to the dollar" in any meaningful way - the USD is trading at three-year lows. Does this signal a loss of status as a safe haven, or is it simply that investors expect the conflict to be contained and localised?    More...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth and describe what felt like a more-normal few days, with signs of a slowing US economy and falling bond yields.  This was suddenly upended by the public and bitter (and very rapid) falling apart of the Trump-Musk relationship.  Musk's backing of Trump was at least partly predicated on promises of a smaller state, but Musk (and DOGE) have failed to deliver the meaningfu...

This week,  Gareth and Jeremy  continue their discussion about the bond market's predicament. Japan's Ministry of Finance thought that sending a questionnaire to its bond investors would resolve its problem. But it soon encountered another difficult auction, suggesting that its first step in acknowledging the problem was insufficient.  Meanwhile, Japan's manufacturing prowess is under attack from...

This week, Gareth and Jeremy discuss Moody's downgrade of US debt, Donald's Big Beautiful Bill (yes, that is what it is called), and the bond vigilantes' work at the long end of the yield curve. Jeremy discusses Japan's special place in all this and wonders how the world's monetary authorities can put the long-term inflation genie back in the bottle. In the UK, inflation and government borrowing w...

Gareth and Jeremy discuss the US-China trade deal and Donald's many other activities: investment advice, trade deals, a ceasefire between India and Pakistan, huge win/win deals in the Middle East, and a crackdown on big pharma. However, although the market has round tripped from the lows of early April, there is lasting damage to financial market confidence from the weaker dollar and stubbornly hi...

This week Jeremy and Gareth  discuss a smorgasbord of newsflow... from trade deals to interest rate cuts (or lack of them) and the selection of Maro Itoje as captain of the Lions team. UK stocks discussed include ZOO Digital and Van Elle , and Jeremy describes the divergent outcomes for Alpha Group and Argentex...two payments/FX trading platforms who have had their resilience tested in recent year...

Jeremy and Gareth discuss a slightly more normal week - Larry Fink and Jamie Dimon are talking up the UK market just as capital is being freed-up from the Mag Seven. The UK small-cap space is delivering strong performance from stocks able to deliver not-worsening performance...we discuss Watkin Jones , Sanderson Design Group and IG Design as well as global shipping heavyweight Clarkson . Jeremy hi...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth wonder whether there are signs of life... UK plc is perhaps "priced for failure" and recent share price moves suggest that even in-line performance (or only a small warning!) can lead to material upside.  Severfield is a case in point, but this week has seen a number of examples. Jupiter and AJ Bell are also talking more positively. Still, risks abound, as the unfortun...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth consider the ongoing shocks to the global system - and wonder whether the UK (or UK plc at least) is unusually well positioned, as well as attractively priced.  Although Trump's "shock and awe" has calmed this week, gold is rising, the dollar is falling and US government debt is highly volatile...it feels as though we've had "America's Brexit moment", a "global Liz Tru...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth   talk less about tariffs and more about their impact on capital markets - bonds in particular.  Jeremy makes the point that the USA is now experiencing a Brexit AND "Liz Truss" moment at the same time - resulting in a falling dollar and rising rates.  Keep an eye on those two, and the gold price, and you have three metrics which give dashboard of the current situation...

Jeremy and Gareth react to Donald Trump's tariff pronouncements - major downward moves in US equities, and increased risk of a US slowdown. But there is  some hope that the UK could navigate these choppy waters cleverly - and even a small proportion of the capital currently being reallocated could make a huge difference to the UK markets. UK stock news from Gear4Music , Pharos , tinyBuild , Intuit...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth discuss some home truths about the UK economy - Rachel Reeves has reassured bond investors for now, but the low-growth stubborn-inflation structural problems persist. Ironically, Trump's erratic tariff-wielding tactics could drive capital AWAY from the USA, to the benefit of China, Germany and even the UK equity market. And this week, a couple of UK stocks with "reason...

Headline grabbing Trump noise from Washington has died down but with concerns around tariffs, and issues in the Ukraine and the Middle East still not settled, Jeremy and Gareth discuss the common theme this week which has been central bankers and companies talking about trade related uncertainty. Overall the forecasts of GDP growth in the major economies in the world are coming down, but inflation...

This week, Jeremy and Gareth mull over the macro situation - the US economy seems to be slowing (but inflation persists) while Europe, especially Germany, has been bullied into spending more than ever.  The UK, and arguably Europe, haven't yet seen much benefit from the outflow of capital from the MAG Seven, but remember, the whole German market cap is not dissimilar to the value of Microsoft - so...

This week, Gareth and Jeremy try to keep up with the gyrations from across the Atlantic - both around defence alliances and tariff policies. In terms of the impact on Europe and the UK, Germany is stepping up and spending big, which is driving up both (European) stock markets and (German) borrowing costs.  Trump seems to be ignoring the stock market and is probably happy that US borrowing costs ar...

Jeremy and Gareth talk this week about Trump 2.0 launching with a number of "adults in the room" who Trump trusts, and who can get things done. One thing that might get done is a US/UK trade deal...Jeremy describes how the stars could align, and how the UK's separation from Europe might save us from the worst of Trump's tariffs. Absent much other UK stock news, Jeremy talks about LSEG, whose resul...

This week, Gareth and Jeremy catch up on the week that marked one full month since Trump's return to the White House. Following JD Vance's lecture to Europe in Munich, the US initiated peace talks with Russia in Riyadh. This confirmed that the old world order has moved to a new one involving power projection by strong men operating in their own economic and strategic interests. Europe, the UN, and...

This week, Gareth and Jeremy tackle the investment implications of Trump 2.0. After shocking the world with his suggestion of turning Gaza into the Riviera of the Middle East, Trump has moved on to Ukraine. Such events illustrate how the accepted World order has broken down. Where is the UN in all of this? One outcome has been a new all-time high in the gold price, indicating heightened risks and...

This week, Gareth is joined by Progressive's Building & Construction analyst, Alastair Stewart .  The pair muse on Trump's tariff-based discussions with various world leaders, with Xi Jinping (the obvious and most-dangerous outlier) adding a bit of Chinese spice to the mix, with some largely-unreported moves.  Alastair describes the UK building stocks, and their reaction to the Bank of England...

With Jeremy enjoying sunnier climes, Gareth is joined by George O'Connor , the Progressive tech analyst.  The week has been dominated by DeepSeek's sudden unveiling of a low-cost Chinese-created competitor in the AI (large language model) world.  George provides some useful perspective on what this means more broadly.  If the Magnificent Seven US tech names lose some of their lustre, the much-vaun...

Jeremy and Gareth talk through the first week of Trump's second term - tariffs are delayed and perhaps downgraded, and Donald has told the Davos attendees how to grow their economies so they can pay for NATO.  Closer to home, Rachel Reeves is unveiling policy after policy designed to spur growth...can it last? And can it work?    This week saw a slew of announcements from UK stocks - builders are...

With peace breaking out in the Middle East, and Trump taking back the keys to the White House, the world is changing fast... Jeremy and Gareth discuss the ways that the USA is causing trouble for other countries - and Rachel Reeves.  But some benign inflation data rode to the rescue, and UK companies reporting "in line" trading are putting on double-digit percentage price gains: perhaps too much n...