US stocks notched a second week of losses, rattled again by the Powell-Lagarde duo’s rate warning. Investors fear that the central banks’ moves to fight inflation tip the economy into recession. Though the Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank raised interest rates by 50 basis points this week as expected, they made it clear that they still have some way to go on tight monetary policy. If Jerome Powell admits that there are some signs of inflation cooling, he also said that “we are not at a restrictive enough stance, even with today's move.” Powell’s hawkish tone hurt sentiment, pushing Wall Street’s main indexes lower. The Dow Jones Industrial Average slid 1.66% (down 9.41% year-to-date), or 556 points. The S&P 500 lost 2.08% (down 19.17% YTD) while the Nasdaq Composite fell 2.72% at 10,705.41 (down 31.57% YTD). Investors are increasingly concerned about a major policy error from central banks, not only in the US.
European indexes were hit harder than their US counterparts as Lagarde delivered an even more hawkish speech, signalling further significant tightening remained ahead in the battle against inflation. The MSCI EMU plunged 3.24% week-over-week (down 14.51% YTD). The FTSE shed 1.93%, sliding into negative territory for the year (down 0.71%).
Asian stocks followed suit though the Chinese government is working on an over 1 trillion yuan ($143 billion) support package to help its semiconductor industry weather U.S. restrictions on chip imports.
The Shanghai Composite index snapped its six-week winning streak. It fell 1.22% bringing its YTD performance to -12.97%. Japan’s Nikkei did not fare better (down 1.34% for the week, down 4.39% YTD).
Energy sector back in spotlight
WTI crude oil prices gained 4.60% over the last five days as China, the world’s biggest oil importer, moved further away from its zero-Covid policy. As a result, energy was the only S&P sector in the green this week (+1.72%) and remains the best performing sector year-to-date (up 51.46%), far outperforming any other equity group.
As was the case last week, defensive sectors fared a little better than the broad market with consumer staples down 1.40% and utilities down 0.55%. By contrast, growth stocks were the worst hit by the Fed’s restrictive monetary policy. Information technology lost 2.67%, weighed down by Apple stocks (APPL, -5.38% over the week). Communication services were also under pressure (down 2.47%) with the freefall in Netflix stocks (NFLX, down 9.16%). The consumer discretionary sector exhibited the poorest performance (-3.63%) as Tesla stocks (TSLA) took a nosedive (down 16.10%) after Elon Musk sold about 22 million more shares in his EV business for $3.6 billion.
Asymmetry between US and European bond yields
The 10-year Treasury yield fell from 3.59% to 3.49% as investors were digesting a disappointing retail sales report that added to concerns the Fed’s rate hiking campaign could lead to a severe recession. Similarly, the 2-year yield lost 14 basis points from 4.34% to 4.20%. The Fed Fund futures closed at 95.16 (May 2023). The terminal rate is now priced at 4.84% for next spring.
In contrast, the yield on the German 10-year Bund jumped from 1.93% to 2.15%. The French 10-year OAT yield moved in tandem with the German bond, adding 30 basis points from 2.39% to 2.69% while the UK 10-year Gilt rose 15 basis points from 3.18% to 3.33%.
This asymmetry between US and European Treasury yields reverberated throughout investment grade corporate bonds. The IBOXX € Liquid Corporates index was down 1.31% over the week (down 12.46% YTD) while the IBOXX Ishares $ Investment Grade Corporate Bond Index edged up 0.23% (down 15.23% YTD).
High-yield bonds lost 0.37% in Europe (IBOXX € Liquid High Yield Index down 9.16% YTD) and 0.17% in the U.S. (Markit iBoxx USD Liquid High Yield Capped Index down 7.57% YTD).
Emerging debt in local currencies gained 0.13% (down 15.33% year-to-date) while the dollar index remained virtually unchanged over the week.
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