Week ending 11/10/24 - The geese are hissing

The Market Call

This week Jeremy and Gareth comment on the "jury's out" reaction to Chinese stimulus, and worries that US inflation may be hard to eradicate.

The UK seems to be doing reasonably well despite investor worries over tax increases and bond-market concerns about increased borrowing. Jeremy quotes a chancellor to Louis XIV, and suggests that Rachel Reeves will do well to produce a budget that "plucks the goose" enough to produce plenty of feathers, but doesn't bring too much hissing. If she does that, markets could rebound strongly.

Despite all the headwinds, the UK market is still showing signs of life...deals from (or for) THG, CAB Payments, Sainsbury's Qatari investors and Tritax Eurobox all suggest that activity is beginning to rebuild, although investment groups are still seeing outflows, and company managements are selling shares, probably in advance of the Budget.

Progressive stocks with news included Petro Matad (closer to production at Heron-1), Beeks (strong FY24 results), ZOO Digital (fireside chat with management around AI risks and opportunity) and this morning a small acquisition from Oxford Metrics of a neatly-adjacent measurement business, Sempre.

Next week sees a flurry of info - from the UK (unemployment data and inflation), Europe (expect a small rate cut), Japan (inflation - beware the carry trade) and China (info this weekend on stimulus detail, and late next week on GDP growth). Plenty going on!

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