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Welcome to Thoughts on the Market. I'm Andrew Sheats, global head of Fixed Income research at Morgan Stanley, today discussing three things that could disrupt a quiet summer It's Wednesday, July 8th at noon in New York. As markets turn the page towards the second half of this year, there are lots of reasons for optimism. Global growth remains solid, earnings growth is strong and broadening across more companies, capital markets remain open and deal activity is robust. We continue to think that the best analogy for current conditions is something like 1997 through 1998 or 2005 through 2006, periods where corporate aggression was increasing and had further to go, leading to equities outperforming credit even more immediately. July also happens to be one of the best months of the year for markets. And while one should never base their entire investment strategy on how far the earth has traveled around the sun, and this month has been the best month for US high yield returns by far over the last 15 years. The last time the S&P 500 fell in the month of July was 2014. So given all that, what could go wrong? Well, here are three things that are on our mind. First, a key part of our more optimistic view is that U.S. inflation will be lower than the Federal Reserve expects in the second half of this year, leading them to leave interest rates unchanged rather than raise rates as the market expects. The risk is that this assumption is just wrong and perhaps soon. There is certainly an argument that if the Fed is worried about inflation, it shouldn't wait to act, and the market is currently placing a roughly 1 in 3 chance that the Fed hikes rates on July 29th if that happens. And again, our base case is that it does not, it could drive volatility. Second is earnings season which kicks off next week. While the general trend of earnings is important, the bigger focus is likely to be on the results of large US tech companies and in particular how much they plan to spend building out AI infrastructure. Over the last several quarters, almost like clockwork, these spending estimates have been revised higher and higher and that's helped boost confidence in AI as the spending is a sign that the technology holds promise as well as boosting the broader earnings outlook. Since all of this spending is becoming other company's revenue, our base case remains that this AI spending cycle has further to run with capex from the major US hyperscalers rising from over 800 billion doll of spending this year to roughly $1.2 trillion of spending next year. But the risk would be that second quarter earnings now show more hesitation to spend, maybe because the share prices of some of these big spenders have been recent underperformers. And given how much of the current growth and earnings story is linked to AI and how popular AI exposure is with investors, that would create a risk. Finally, there's Iran. Our base case assumes a gradual renormalization of flows through the Strait of Hormuz, and we forecast Brent oil at about $75 a barrel in 12 months time, which is pretty similar to current levels. But as of this recording there were reports of renewed hostilities and the ceasefire may be fragile. The US has already drawn down its Strategic Petroleum Reserve to its lowest ever levels, potentially reducing some ability to absorb shocks if the conflict re escalates. Historically, July tends to be strong and markets have a number of helpful tailwinds at their back. But an unexpected rate hike, an unexpected reduction in hyperscaler capex and a resumption of the Iran conflict are three factors that are not in our base case and could disrupt that. Thank you as always for your time. If you find thoughts of the market useful, let us know by leaving a review wherever you listen and also tell a friend or colleague about us today.
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