Author: Murat Basboga (Murat Basboga)

Sometimes, you may need a bit of time to grasp an economic or geopolitical event’s importance in your limited time on this lovely planet. Less than a quarter of a century ago, Afghanistan rose to a promising country with the reforms made by the government, supported financially and militarily by the West. However, after the...

A year or two after the debilitating global financial crisis (GFC) of 2008/09 many central banks started to lift rates again. However, they did not get very far. Not only did they have to reverse the rate hikes; they had to take rates down to much lower levels and even conduct quantitative easing (QE) once...

Is spread of the delta variant really going to get as bad as last autumn during the last wave when the vaccination campaign had not even started? I assume that another factor might be playing a role too: the end of fiscal supports. These helped to prevent a more pronounced collapse of the economy last...

While the fanfare of the G7 leaders’ summit has taken place in picturesque Cornwall, UK last week, the a bigger event happened a few days before.: the minimum global corporate tax for multinationals, I mean. The OECD has been working on this proposal for the last two years. The minimum global tax is simply one...

The famous section title from the New Yorker Magazine suits my purposes for a brief review of current markets. The headlines are full of accusations by Dominic Cummings, ex-senior advisor to Prime Minister Boris Johnson, against the UK government’s handling of the pandemic: Incompetence, opaque explanations of the measures taken to tackle the crisis, etc....

Brexit is an unwelcome topic for many people. Thankfully there are no more trade talks or end of year deadlines for investors to worry about. That said, Brexit still casts various shadows. The latest has prompted the UK to send a gunboat or two to protect the island of Jersey from French fishermen. By the...

Last Thursday marked the 100th day of Joe Biden’s presidency in the U.S., and over that time the S&P 500 Index has gained 10.9%. Purely judged in stock market terms, this marks the most successful start to a presidency since Franklin Roosevelt in 1933, who swiftly passed a number of measures to get the country...

Avid readers of the financial press may already be familiar with the rare earth (commodities) and their oxides, used by manufacturers of turbines and cars. To cut to the chase, the rare and most precious commodity is stability. Maybe it may be a far-reaching analogy, but it works fine. If you would like to have...

Government bond markets, and particularly the treasury market have been concerned this year about the possibility of sharp increases in inflation. Are these concerns valid? The answer is ‘yes-and-no’. The markets should be wise to the prospects of higher inflation over the longer-term, but calm about rising prices in coming months. Concerns about inflation have...

The upbeat momentum with the vaccination program in developed countries has helped accelerate the boost in the markets. A marked increase in U.S. Treasury bond yields pressured higher growth areas of the equity markets and accompanying U.S. dollar strength was also a headwind for emerging markets. Emerging markets investors are exhibiting a lack of market...