Finance

Economic turbulence ‘effectively assured’ Fed will cut interest rates in September

Published

8 months ago

August 8, 2024

Business Finance News

The Dow Jones dropped by over 1,000 points on Monday and has been struggling since. (iStock )

A surprising jobs report released last week paired with a volatile Japanese market led to a massive selloff during Monday’s trading day, with both the Dow Jones and the S&P seeing their worst sessions since 2022.

In the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ most recent employment report, only 114,000 jobs were added, down substantially from the previous month when 206,000 jobs were added. This sudden slowdown in employment has led to mounting concerns about an economic recession. The selloff, largely set off by the report, has some uncomfortable similarities to market crashes like the 1987 Black Monday stock market crash and the financial crisis of 2008.

Along with fewer jobs added, the unemployment rate shot up to 4.3% in July, adding to the mounting fears that ultimately led to Monday’s troubles. The Dow dropped by more than 1,000 points, or 2.6%, while the S&P 500 slid 3%.

On Tuesday, stocks recovered slightly as recession fears lessened and Japanese equities rallied. The Dow Jones rose by just over 294 points and the S&P 500 rose 1.04%. This ended the three-day stretch of market losses. Global markets also recovered as Japanese stocks rebounded, with the Nikkei 225 seeing its best day since October 2008, jumping 10.2%. On Monday, the Nikkei dropped by 12.4%.

Wednesday ended the gains the market made the day before, with the Dow falling 234 points by the end of the day. The S&P 500 also dropped again by 0.8%.

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A turbulent market may be good for interest rate cuts

Despite a rough week for the stock market, the jobs report has effectively assured the rate cuts expected in September will happen, Melissa Cohn, William Raveis Mortgage regional vice president, said in a statement.

Consumers have been waiting for these rate cuts to start borrowing again, but they should only expect a small initial cut. Should the Fed cut rates multiple times through the end of the year, then consumers may see more substantial movement in interest rates.

“People also need to remember that mortgage rates aren’t going to change based on a Fed cut,” Cohn said. “Your home equity rate will drop. Your student loans, car loans, all those rates will drop every time the Fed cuts rates, but mortgage rates are tied to the bond market, and the bond market is more affiliated with the rate of inflation and bad economic data than it is to the Fed funds rate.”

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Economists can’t decide whether the US is headed toward recession

This week’s ebb and flow of the market created a complicated look at where the economy may be heading. Economists have differing opinions on whether this means the U.S. is catapulting toward a recession.

The unemployment rate rising to 4.3% triggered an economic rule known as the Sahm rule, which is an indicator of a recession. The rule states that a sudden increase by 0.5 percentage points in the unemployment rate within a 12-month period typically indicates a recession is coming.

However, despite this indicator, it’s “very doubtful” that a recession has started, Adam Schickling, a Vanguard senior economist said. There are conflicting reports that have led Schickling to make this statement.

“A significant and persistent deviation between the household and establishment surveys has created a unique paradox of the unemployment rate rising 60 basis points since July 2023 even as job creation in the establishment survey has more than offset an increase in the labor force,” Schickling explained.

Fears of a recession may simply be an overreaction to a bad week for the market and a month of weak employment, according to some economists. Still, a continued cooldown of the employment market could signal a cause for concern.

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Finance

China’s response to U.S. tariffs will likely focus on stimulus, trade

Published

2 hours ago

April 3, 2025

Business Finance News

Chinese national flags flutter on boats near shipping containers at the Yangshan Port outside Shanghai, China, February 7, 2025.

Go Nakamura | Reuters

BEIJING — China’s reaction to new U.S. tariffs will likely focus on domestic stimulus and strengthening ties with trading partners, according to analysts based in Greater China.

Hours after U.S. President Donald Trump announced additional 34% tariffs on China, the Chinese Ministry of Commerce called on the U.S. to cancel the tariffs, and vowed unspecified countermeasures. The sweeping U.S. policy also slapped new duties on the European Union and major Asian countries.

Chinese exports to the U.S. this year had already been hit by 20% in additional tariffs, raising the total rate on shipments from China to 54%, among the highest levied by the Trump administration. The effective rate for individual product lines can vary.

But, as has been the case, the closing line of the Chinese statement was a call to negotiate.

“I think the focus of China’s response in the near term won’t be retaliatory tariffs or such measures,” said Bruce Pang, adjunct associate professor at CUHK Business School. That’s according to a CNBC translation of the Chinese-language statement.

Instead, Pang expects China to focus on improving its own economy by diversifying export destinations and products, as well as doubling down on its priority of boosting domestic consumption.

Watch for cascading tariffs as tariffs reroute trade within Asia, says economist

China, the world’s second-largest economy, has since September stepped up stimulus efforts by expanding the fiscal deficit, increasing a consumption trade-in subsidy program and calling for a halt in the real estate slump. Notably, Chinese President Xi Jinping held a rare meeting with tech entrepreneurs including Alibaba founder Jack Ma in February, in a show of support for the private sector.

The policy reversal — from regulatory tightening in recent years — reflects how Beijing has been “anticipating the coming slowdown or even crash in exports,” Macquarie’s Chief China Economist Larry Hu said in a report, ahead of Trump’s latest tariff announcement. He pointed out that the pandemic-induced export boom of 2021 enabled Beijing to “launch a massive regulatory campaign.”

“My view stays the same,” Hu said in an email Thursday. “Beijing will use domestic stimulus to offset the impact of tariffs, so that they could still achieve the growth target of ‘around 5%.'”

Instead of retaliatory tariffs, Hu also expects Beijing will focus on still using blacklists, export controls on critical minerals and probes into foreign companies in China. Hu also anticipates China will keep the yuan strong against the U.S. dollar and resist calls from retailers to cut prices — as a way to push inflationary pressure onto the U.S.

China’s top leaders in early March announced they would pursue a target of around 5% growth in gross domestic product this year, a task they emphasized would require “very arduous work” to achieve. The finance ministry also hinted it could increase fiscal support if needed.

About 20% of China’s economy relies on exports, according to Goldman Sachs. They previously estimated that new U.S. tariffs of around 60% on China would lower real GDP by around 2 percentage points. The firm still maintains a full-year forecast of 4.5% GDP growth.

Changing global trade

What’s different from the impact of tariffs under Trump’s first term is that China is not the only target, but one of a swath of countries facing hefty levies on their exports to the U.S. Some of these countries, such as Vietnam and Thailand, had served as alternate routes for Chinese goods to reach the U.S.

At the Chinese export hub of Yiwu on Thursday, businesses seemed nonchalant about the impact of the new U.S. tariffs, due to a perception their overseas competitors wouldn’t gain an advantage, said Cameron Johnson, a Shanghai-based senior partner at consulting firm Tidalwave Solutions.

He pointed out that previously, the U.S. had focused its trade measures on forcing companies to remove China from their supply chains and go to other countries. But Chinese manufacturers had expanded overseas alongside that diversification, he said.

“The reality is this [new U.S. tariff policy] essentially gives most of Asia and Africa to China, and the U.S. is not prepared,” Johnson said. He expects China won’t make things unnecessarily difficult for U.S. businesses operating in the country and instead will try harder to build other trade relationships.

Since Trump’s first four-year term ended in early 2021, China has increased its trade with Southeast Asia so much that the region is now Beijing’s largest trading partner, followed by the European Union and then the U.S.

The 10 member states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) joined China, Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand in forming the world’s largest free trade bloc — the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) — which came into being in early 2022. The U.S. and India are not members of the RCEP.

“RCEP member countries will naturally deepen trade ties with one another,” Yue Su, principal economist, China, at the Economist Intelligence Unit, said in a note Thursday.

“This is also partly because China’s economy is likely to remain the most — or at least among the most—stable in relative terms, given the government’s strong commitment to its growth targets and its readiness to deploy fiscal policy measures when needed,” she said.

Uncertainties remain

The extent to which all countries will be slapped with tariffs this week remains uncertain as Trump is widely expected to use the duties as a negotiating tactic, especially with China.

He said last week the U.S. could lower its tariffs on China to help close a deal for Beijing-based ByteDance to sell TikTok’s U.S. operations.

But the level of new tariffs on China was worse than many investors expected.

“Unlike some of the optimistic market forecasts, we do not expect a US-China bilateral grand bargain,” Ting Lu, chief China economist at Nomura, said in a note Thursday.

“We expect tensions between these two mega economies to worsen significantly,” he said, “especially as China has been making large strides in high-tech sectors, including AI and robotics.”