50 basis points? 75 basis points? Investors, who have been watching for days for indications of the new interest rate hike in the United States in September, will they see more clearly in the coming hours? The question will be at the heart of the debates of the central bankers who meet, from this Thursday, in the town of Jackson Hole, in Wyoming, for the traditional annual economic symposium. The intervention of the President of the American Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, is being watched there like milk on the fire, at a time when inflation peaks at 8.5% in the country … far from the objective of a price increase of around 2%. He will speak Friday at 4 p.m. Paris time.
A year ago, at the same time, the central banker remained convinced that the inflationary pressures – inflation was then 5.4% – were temporary, essentially attributable to the distribution channels. ” Answering it might do more harm than good.he had launched, [une hausse des taux] inadvertently slows employment unnecessarily and pushes inflation lower than desired. Today, as unemployment remains substantial and the pandemic continues, such a mistake could be particularly damaging?. At that time, the first interest rate hike was not expected before 2023. Since then, many events have occurred, including the war in Ukraine and the re-containments in China. For Luke Bartholomew, economist at Abrdn interviewed by CNBC, Jerome Powell could take the opportunity of this speech to make a ” MEA culpa ». « Powell is likely to point out that there is still a long way to go before the Fed can judge that the economy has returned to price stability. This is all the more important since the market has recently behaved as if the Fed had abandoned its offensive bias. “, continues the expert.
Ifo at its lowest since June 2020
In the meantime, the financial centers are playing it safe. the Dow Jones gleaned 0.10%, while in Europe, Dax 40 a ended with a modest gain of 0.32% and the Cac 40 fell 0.08%, to 6,381.56 points, in a small volume of trade reduced by 2.2 billion euros. In addition to Jackson Hole, European investors are worried about the new surge in energy prices, which has become synonymous, according to experts, with an increased risk of recession. The Dutch TTF futures contract, the benchmark for the European natural gas market, is trading at 311.60 euros, not far from its historic high of 345 euros recorded on March 7, less than two weeks after the start of the war in Ukraine. . This surge is still linked to the announcement on Friday by the Russian gas giant Gazprom of a new cut in deliveries by the Nord Stream 1 pipeline for “maintenance”. Prices are also boosted by climatic conditions in Europe, droughts and heat waves having resulted in increased energy demand for air cooling. Faced with such a situation, investor confidence can only weaken further. In Germany, the Ifo business climate index, released in the morning, fell to its lowest level since June 2020 at 88.5 points in August, after 88.7 in July.
On the value side, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield (+3.91%) sold its 49% share in the Westfield Santa Anita shopping center in California, thus continuing its debt reduction program.
Across the Atlantic, the electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla has halved the nominal of its sharesin order to make the share more accessible to employees and small shareholders.