Thursday saw the UK and the EU engage in further Brexit negotiations, with the issue of the Irish border again proving to be a sticking point. However, whilst further negotiations are to take place, it was the UK Foreign Secretary Jeremey Hunt that hit front pages, playing up the risk of a ‘no deal’ Brexit… before backtracking and stating that Britain could prosper without a deal. Ultimately it is important to see through this rhetoric and look at the uncertainties that remain, and without a firm deal in place, from an investment standpoint the majority of the FTSE100 being overseas earners is a crucial positive to mitigate volatility.
By way of an abstract piece of news, with the Brazilian elections due to commence in October, the leading candidate Lula Da Silva formerly registered his candidacy on Wednesday. What is interesting is that Lula was imprisoned in April of this year after being found guilty of money laundering and corruption. Whilst the law states that an incarcerated individual cannot run for president, they can legally register to run, taking months before courts are able to reject their bid. Lula has the backing of over a third of the voters, with protests continuing to take place over his arrest. Whilst this is not a market moving event, rather one of interest and uniqueness, once there is more certainty over who is legally running for the presidency, it could inject an air of much need certainty into a Brazilian market that is becoming undervalued.
Outside of the few key political events, there was a raft of inflation and trade data released this past week. On Tuesday French and German CPI came in on expectation (2.3% and 2% respectively), seeing inflation in broader Europe also in line with expectation at 2% today (Friday), suggesting a strength in the core demand despite shorter term uncertainty surrounding trade and the Turkish economy. UK inflation data was also in line with expectation at 2.5% when released on Wednesday, marginally higher than prior. US industrial production for July missed expectation suggesting the impact of trade tensions are starting to show. However, for US smaller companies where this is less significant we saw ‘small business confidence’ data come in considerably higher than expectation at 107.9. On Thursday we saw the Indian trade balance come in more negative than anticipated, with rising fuel prices for one of the world’s biggest oil importers the primary cause. As such, the Indian government has announced plans to counteract this by increasing ethanol content in fuel.
Jonathan Wiseman, Chartered Wealth Manager