Plugging the holes
The Autumn Statement, budget-in-all-but-name, had been signposted as very likely to bring bad news to UK taxpayers, as the third Conservative government of this parliament changed course from Trussonomics back to Rishinomics. As we had suspected in our video update last week, what was announced in the end was less bad than what had been leaked beforehand, which is how bad news tends to be sold. With fiscal responsibility returning to the UK, and with it a certain predictability in policymaking, this Autumn ‘budget’ was perceived as quite sensible from a capital market perspective, with sterling and bond yields closing within their most recent trading ranges.
Bullish on Chin
Less than a month ago, foreign investors were fleeing China. The 20th Communist Party conference had just re-anointed Xi Jinping as the nation’s paramount leader, against a backdrop of faltering growth, corporate crackdowns, Covid restrictions and heightened tensions with the US. Commentators decried yet again China was becoming “un-investable”, preceding an exodus of overseas capital from the world’s second-largest economy. Chinese assets hence saw significant losses.