by Bill | Dec 13, 2013 | European Economy, Featured
There is an interesting story this morning on Bloomberg about the travails of European automakers and the strong euro. According to Bloomberg, the already troubled French automaker Peugeot will take a €1.1 bn non-cash charge due to adverse currency fluctuations in...
by Bill | Nov 11, 2013 | European Economy, Featured
There are some notable reasons for near-term reasons for optimism in the UK. The housing market seems to be picking up, industrial production growth is looking up together with PMI data and the equity market has done well. All these are real and significant signs of...
by Bill | Oct 1, 2013 | European Economy, Featured, Global Economy
The notion of a perfect storm is a tired cliché but in Portugal’s case, its use has rarely been more apt. Our view is that the market is underestimating the risks surrounding Portuguese debt roll-over and planned exit from the Troika programme in 2014. According to...
by Bill | Sep 23, 2013 | Emerging Markets, European Economy
Below is an excerpt from our weekly report from last Wednesday. On Friday, Moody’s downgraded Ukraine to Caa1 (from B3), citing plummeting FX reserves, downside risk from future negotiations with the IMF, and Ukraine’s worsening relations with Russia....
by Bill | Sep 13, 2013 | European Economy, Featured, Global Economy, UK
Data in the UK have taken an unequivocally positive turn. PMIs for services, construction and manufacturing are at 3 year highs. Furthermore, the underlying picture is healthy, with the new orders to inventory ratio for manufacturing surging to 1.4. This has...
by Bill | Aug 13, 2013 | European Economy, Leading Indicators
Variant Perception has been writing about positive leading indicators in Europe for the past 6 months and, in this light, the recent improvement in the data is coming in as expected. The cyclical recovery in Europe is real and will likely have further to go in the...
by Bill | May 31, 2013 | European Economy, Press
Variant Perception’s Claus Vistesen was on BBC World Business this week talking about the eurozone periphery and how governments will be given more time to adjust their budget deficits. You can play the clip here through BBC’s iPlayer (UK viewers only,...
by Bill | Apr 30, 2013 | European Economy, Featured, Fiscal Policy
The spotlight remained on Portugal the end of last week as EU finance ministers agreed to give the country seven more years to repay its stock of existing loans. Still, despite the words of praise showered on the country the deficit containment record has been a...
by Bill | Apr 23, 2013 | China, European Economy, Featured, Global Economy, US Economy
Germany remains the proverbial strong man of Europe, but we are skeptical that this is a fitting moniker. Looking at exports, it is now clear that Germany and thus Europe continues to see weakness. The total value of German exports has now clearly rolled over from its...
