Economic data continues to weaken globally, leading global central banks to start easing policy again.

The FOMC moved to lower interest rates on July 31st for the first time since December 2008. However, the most recent policy moves made by the majority of global central banks have been to lower rates, which has been reported less frequently. Most of those rate cuts have occurred this year.

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The global easing trend started in emerging market countries, where 85% of the banks have been easing then spread to the rest of the world, where 80% of central banks are lowering interest rates.

We believe the driving factors behind these moves have been the continued weakness in leading economic indicators highlighted all year. Originally, the weakness was in global markets outside of the U.S. and centered in manufacturing.

While those areas are still the weakest, their troubles are spilling over into the U.S. and the Services sectors.

In May, we wrote about some of market-based sentiment indicators that we follow and a subset of charts that monitor developments in trade negotiations. Since this has been a recent trending topic, we thought it would be helpful to provide an update on some of the indicators mentioned in May as well as a few new ones we have discovered. The vast majority of them have either weakened since May or have downtrended since the beginning of the summer. These indicators would suggest that there is a possibility the weakness will continue and that progress on a trade deal look far off.

Source: FactSet.

The views expressed herein are presented for informational purposes only and are not intended as a recommendation to invest in any particular asset class or security or as a promise of future performance. The information, opinions, and views contained herein are current only as of the date hereof and are subject to change at any time without prior notice.

Rank Dawson, CFA, FDP

Senior Vice President, Investment Strategy
Boyd Watterson Asset Management, LLC