A selloff in the riskier corners of the market deepened as the U.K.’s plan to lift its economy fuelled concerns about heightened inflation that could lead to higher rates, adding to fears of a global recession.
It was a sea of red across equity trading desks, with the S&P 500 briefly breaching its June closing trough — and failing to pierce its intraday low for the year. Chartists looking for signs of where the rout might ease had identified that as a potential area for support. Yet the lack of full-blown capitulation may be an indication the drawdown isn’t over. Goldman Sachs Group Inc. slashed its target for U.S. stocks, warning that a dramatic upward shift in the outlook for rates will weigh on valuations.
As risk-off sentiment took hold, Wall Street’s “fear gauge” soared to a three-month high, with the Cboe Volatility Index momentarily topping 30. Throughout the year, the U.S. equity benchmark has hit near-term lows when the VIX was above that level, according to DataTrek Research.
A surge in the greenback to a fresh record swept aside global currencies. The euro slid to its weakest since 2002, while sterling hit a 37-year low — with former U.S. Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers saying that “naive” U.K. policies may create the circumstances for the pound to sink past parity with the dollar.
Treasury 10-year yields fell after earlier topping 3.8 per cent. Meanwhile, two-year US rates climbed for 12 straight days — an up streak not seen since at least 1976.
“It appears that traders and investors are going to throw in the towel on this week in what feels like ‘the sky is falling’ type of event,” said Kenny Polcari, chief strategist at SlateStone Wealth. “Once everyone stops saying that they ‘think a recession is coming’ and accepts the fact that it is here already – then the psyche will change.”
Liz Truss’s new U.K. government delivered the most sweeping tax cuts since 1972 at a time when the Bank of England is struggling to rein in inflation, which is running at almost five times its target. The plunge in gilts means that investors are now betting the central bank boosts its benchmark lending rate by a full point to 3.25 per cent in November, which would be the sharpest increase since 1989.
Amid heightened fears over a hard economic landing, commodities got hammered across the board. West Texas Intermediate settled below $79 a barrel for the first time since January, posting its longest stretch of weekly losses this year. Not even gold — a haven asset — was able to gain due to a surging dollar, and sank to the lowest level in two years.
The greenback’s strength has been unrelenting and will also exert a “meaningful drag” on corporate earnings — serving as a key headwind for stocks, said David Rosenberg, founder of his namesake research firm.
KKR & Co. sees potential trouble ahead, including a mild recession next year, with the Fed narrowly focused on driving up unemployment to tame inflation. The US labor shortage is so severe that it’s possible the Fed’s tightening doesn’t work, wrote Henry McVey, chief investment officer of the firm’s balance sheet.
“This is a more draconian outcome than corporate profits falling,” he noted, “because it will encourage the Fed to tighten even further.”
Investors are flocking to cash and shunning almost every other asset class as they turn the most pessimistic since the global financial crisis, according to Bank of America Corp. Investor sentiment is “unquestionably” the worst it’s been since the turmoil of 2008, strategists led by Michael Hartnett wrote in a note.
“It’s a realization that interest rates are going to continue to rise here and that that’s going to put pressure on earnings,” said Chris Gaffney, president of world markets at TIAA Bank. “Valuations are still a little high even though they’ve come down, interest rates still have a lot further to go up and what impact that will have on the global economy — are we headed for a sharper recession than the recession everybody expected? I think it’s a combination of all of that, it’s not good news.”
‘MEANINGFUL DRAG’
Amid heightened fears over a hard economic landing, commodities got hammered across the board. West Texas Intermediate tumbled below $79 a barrel for the first time since January, posting its longest stretch of weekly losses this year. Not even gold — a haven asset — was able to gain due to a surging dollar, and sank to the lowest level in two years.
The greenback’s strength has been unrelenting and will also exert a “meaningful drag” on corporate earnings — serving as a key headwind for stocks, said David Rosenberg, founder of his namesake research firm.
KKR & Co. sees potential trouble ahead, including a mild recession next year, with the Fed narrowly focused on driving up unemployment to tame inflation. The US labor shortage is so severe that it’s possible the Fed’s tightening doesn’t work, wrote Henry McVey, chief investment officer of the firm’s balance sheet.
“This is a more draconian outcome than corporate profits falling,” he noted, “because it will encourage the Fed to tighten even further.”
Investors are flocking to cash and shunning almost every other asset class as they turn the most pessimistic since the global financial crisis, according to Bank of America Corp. Investor sentiment is “unquestionably” the worst it’s been since the crisis of 2008, strategists led by Michael Hartnett wrote in a note.
“It’s a realization that interest rates are going to continue to rise here and that that’s going to put pressure on earnings,” said Chris Gaffney, president of world markets at TIAA Bank. “Valuations are still a little high even though they’ve come down, interest rates still have a lot further to go up and what impact that will have on the global economy — are we headed for a sharper recession than the recession everybody expected? I think it’s a combination of all of that, it’s not good news.”
EXTREME PESSIMISM
Stocks are indeed still far from being obvious bargains. At the low in June, the S&P 500 was trading at 18 times earnings, a multiple that surpassed trough valuations seen in all previous 11 bear cycles, data compiled by Bloomberg show. In other words, should equities recover from here, this bear-market bottom will have been the most expensive since the 1950s.
Bleak sentiment is often considered a contrarian indicator for the US stock market, under the belief that extreme pessimism may signal brighter times ahead. But history suggests that equity losses may accelerate even further from here before the current bear market ends, according to Ned Davis Research.
In another threat to stocks, different iterations of the so-called Fed model, which compares bond yields to stock earnings’ yields, show equities are least appealing relative to corporate bonds and Treasuries since 2009 and early 2010, respectively. This signal is getting attention among investors, who can now know look to other markets for similar or better returns.
“The next question is when and how far do earnings estimates decline for 2023,” said Ellen Hazen, chief market strategist and portfolio manager at F.L. Putnam Investment Management. “Earnings estimates for next year are too high, they really have not come down, and as that happens you’re going to have further equity pain because in addition to the multiple coming down via the yield mechanism, the earnings you’re applying that multiple to are going to come down as well.”
As slower growth and tighter financial conditions start catching up to companies, a wave of downgrades will come for the US investment-grade corporate bond market.
That’s according to strategists at Barclays Plc, who say companies are facing margin pressure thanks to high inventories, supply chain issues, and a strong dollar. The firm expects the average monthly volume of downgrades to increase to $180 billion of bonds over the next half year. The current monthly average is closer to $40 billion.
Some of the main moves in markets:
Stocks
The S&P 500 fell 1.7 per cent as of 4 p.m. New York time
The Nasdaq 100 fell 1.7 per cent
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 1.6 per cent
The MSCI World index fell 2.1 per cent
Currencies
The Bloomberg Dollar Spot Index rose 1.3 per cent
The euro fell 1.5 per cent to $0.9693
The British pound fell 3.5 per cent to $1.0868
The Japanese yen fell 0.6 per cent to 143.30 per dollar
Cryptocurrencies
Bitcoin fell 2.2 per cent to $18,823.63
Ether fell 2.4 per cent to $1,292.77
Bonds
The yield on 10-year Treasuries declined four basis points to 3.68 per cent
Germany’s 10-year yield advanced six basis points to 2.02 per cent
Britain’s 10-year yield advanced 33 basis points to 3.83 per cent
Commodities
West Texas Intermediate crude fell 5.3 per cent to $79.06 a barrel
Gold futures fell 1.7 per cent to $1,651.80 an ounce
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese technology group SoftBank swung back to profitability in the July-September quarter, boosted by positive results in its Vision Fund investments.
Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. reported Tuesday a fiscal second quarter profit of nearly 1.18 trillion yen ($7.7 billion), compared with a 931 billion yen loss in the year-earlier period.
Quarterly sales edged up about 6% to nearly 1.77 trillion yen ($11.5 billion).
SoftBank credited income from royalties and licensing related to its holdings in Arm, a computer chip-designing company, whose business spans smartphones, data centers, networking equipment, automotive, consumer electronic devices, and AI applications.
The results were also helped by the absence of losses related to SoftBank’s investment in office-space sharing venture WeWork, which hit the previous fiscal year.
WeWork, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023, emerged from Chapter 11 in June.
SoftBank has benefitted in recent months from rising share prices in some investment, such as U.S.-based e-commerce company Coupang, Chinese mobility provider DiDi Global and Bytedance, the Chinese developer of TikTok.
SoftBank’s financial results tend to swing wildly, partly because of its sprawling investment portfolio that includes search engine Yahoo, Chinese retailer Alibaba, and artificial intelligence company Nvidia.
SoftBank makes investments in a variety of companies that it groups together in a series of Vision Funds.
The company’s founder, Masayoshi Son, is a pioneer in technology investment in Japan. SoftBank Group does not give earnings forecasts.
Shopify Inc. executives brushed off concerns that incoming U.S. President Donald Trump will be a major detriment to many of the company’s merchants.
“There’s nothing in what we’ve heard from Trump, nor would there have been anything from (Democratic candidate) Kamala (Harris), which we think impacts the overall state of new business formation and entrepreneurship,” Shopify’s chief financial officer Jeff Hoffmeister told analysts on a call Tuesday.
“We still feel really good about all the merchants out there, all the entrepreneurs that want to start new businesses and that’s obviously not going to change with the administration.”
Hoffmeister’s comments come a week after Trump, a Republican businessman, trounced Harris in an election that will soon return him to the Oval Office.
On the campaign trail, he threatened to impose tariffs of 60 per cent on imports from China and roughly 10 per cent to 20 per cent on goods from all other countries.
If the president-elect makes good on the promise, many worry the cost of operating will soar for companies, including customers of Shopify, which sells e-commerce software to small businesses but also brands as big as Kylie Cosmetics and Victoria’s Secret.
These merchants may feel they have no choice but to pass on the increases to customers, perhaps sparking more inflation.
If Trump’s tariffs do come to fruition, Shopify’s president Harley Finkelstein pointed out China is “not a huge area” for Shopify.
However, “we can’t anticipate what every presidential administration is going to do,” he cautioned.
He likened the uncertainty facing the business community to the COVID-19 pandemic where Shopify had to help companies migrate online.
“Our job is no matter what comes the way of our merchants, we provide them with tools and service and support for them to navigate it really well,” he said.
Finkelstein was questioned about the forthcoming U.S. leadership change on a call meant to delve into Shopify’s latest earnings, which sent shares soaring 27 per cent to $158.63 shortly after Tuesday’s market open.
The Ottawa-based company, which keeps its books in U.S. dollars, reported US$828 million in net income for its third quarter, up from US$718 million in the same quarter last year, as its revenue rose 26 per cent.
Revenue for the period ended Sept. 30 totalled US$2.16 billion, up from US$1.71 billion a year earlier.
Subscription solutions revenue reached US$610 million, up from US$486 million in the same quarter last year.
Merchant solutions revenue amounted to US$1.55 billion, up from US$1.23 billion.
Shopify’s net income excluding the impact of equity investments totalled US$344 million for the quarter, up from US$173 million in the same quarter last year.
Daniel Chan, a TD Cowen analyst, said the results show Shopify has a leadership position in the e-commerce world and “a continued ability to gain market share.”
In its outlook for its fourth quarter of 2024, the company said it expects revenue to grow at a mid-to-high-twenties percentage rate on a year-over-year basis.
“Q4 guidance suggests Shopify will finish the year strong, with better-than-expected revenue growth and operating margin,” Chan pointed out in a note to investors.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
TORONTO – RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust says it has cut almost 10 per cent of its staff as it deals with a slowdown in the condo market and overall pushes for greater efficiency.
The company says the cuts, which amount to around 60 employees based on its last annual filing, will mean about $9 million in restructuring charges and should translate to about $8 million in annualized cash savings.
The job cuts come as RioCan and others scale back condo development plans as the market softens, but chief executive Jonathan Gitlin says the reductions were from a companywide efficiency effort.
RioCan says it doesn’t plan to start any new construction of mixed-use properties this year and well into 2025 as it adjusts to the shifting market demand.
The company reported a net income of $96.9 million in the third quarter, up from a loss of $73.5 million last year, as it saw a $159 million boost from a favourable change in the fair value of investment properties.
RioCan reported what it says is a record-breaking 97.8 per cent occupancy rate in the quarter including retail committed occupancy of 98.6 per cent.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
