APAC Assistance’s Lighthearted Review of Australasian Markets and Global Macro Issues (Issue No. 37 December 10, 2018)
CHART(S) OF THE WEEK:
Most Sydney property owners are millionaires (on paper at least).
The single biggest reason for that state of affairs is US Federal Reserve monetary policy, mostly dictated astride Wall St, New York.
Fed policy is also the main factor influencing global asset pricing over the last decade, if not longer.
During the GFC the Fed collapsed US interest rates (chart below) and simultaneously expanded the size of their balance sheet by >US$3 trillion.
But since 2015, US interest rates have steadily increased, encouraging a slow retreat of funds (globally), back to the US. Hence current market ‘volatility’: