The US and China have agreed to a 90-day truce in the trade war, following negotiations in Geneva. As part of the deal, the US will reduce tariffs on Chinese imports from 145% to 30%, and China will lower its duties on American goods from 125% to 10%. Markets have welcomed these developments, but key questions still remain about the implications for the economy and inflation. This uncertainty puts the Federal Reserve (Fed) in a tough spot, and we await more clarity on the Fed’s direction from Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s comments on 15 May.

In Asia, the India–Pakistan conflict has calmed following a US-mediated ceasefire. We note that historically markets have typically recovered within a month of previous India-Pakistan conflicts, and continue to monitor key indicators such as the Indian Rupee and Foreign Institutional Investor (FII) flows, as well as geopolitical developments.

This episode is presented by Chintan Bhindora from the Julius Baer Research Asia team.

In this episode of The Week in Markets, equities research analyst Jen-Ai Chua discusses the Trump effect on US GDP growth and on recent election outcomes in Canada, Australia and Singapore. The flight to safety by voters and investors have favoured familiar incumbents and driven capital flows into gold, European equities and Chinese stocks. Markets are likely to remain in wait-and-see mode as investors await the FOMC rate decision on 7 May and the BoE decision a day later. The age-old adage to ‘Sell in May and go away’ could prompt some risk-averse investors to reconsider their stock positions. Historical evidence supports outperformance in the November-April time period, albeit 68% of the time.

US Treasuries and equities staged a strong comeback last week after US President Donald Trump appeared to strike a conciliatory tone on Fed Chair Jerome Powell and on the tariff deadlock with China. However, several US manufacturing activity indicators point to renewed contraction in regional manufacturing activities, and polls conducted by ABC News and The Washington Post revealed that 64% of respondents disapprove of the Trump tariffs, and 7 in 10 believe that the tariffs will lead to higher inflation.

Against this backdrop, Julius Baer now expects two 50 bps rate cuts for the US, and have raised its recession probability to 50% from 35% for the next 12 months.

This episode is presented by Magdalene Teo, Head of Fixed Income Research Asia at Julius Baer.