Super-Macro Management

Super-Macro Management

SuperMacro provides a summary of the most critical economic and financial news from the major regions, with insights into the impact on markets and policy. We take a detailed look at the fundamentals once a week, highlighting opportunities for tactical trading strategies and longer-term investments.

  1. 1d ago

    Sovereign Bonds Can't Catch a Break

    The data all pointed one way last week. Payrolls missed, CPI and PPI came in benign, retail sales underwhelmed across every single aggregate. Sovereign bonds caught a bid, then sold off almost immediately. When bonds cannot rally on their own good news, the problem is not the data. The US interest bill has now overtaken the defence bill. Niall Ferguson's law says any great power that spends more on debt servicing than defence risks ceasing to be a great power, and the US is running a deficit of 5.5 to 6% at full employment with unemployment at 4.1%. There is no reform coming, in any G7 country, because nobody is going to vote for it. Elvis sits down with veteran macro trader Jonny Matthews, 25 years of institutional experience at Brevan Howard and Citigroup, to work through why the long end sold off into weak data, what the deficit does when the economy finally turns, and why he is still short treasuries. In this episode: Why sovereign bonds sold off into a weak payrolls print, benign inflation and soft retail sales G7 debt to GDP ratios, and the US on track to pass Italy from over 120% Japan cutting 220% to 200% with no reform at all, just nominal GDP running above the interest rate A 6% deficit at full employment, and where it goes in even a mild recession Ferguson's law: the interest bill has passed the defence bill, and neither one is coming down AI capex arriving in the bond market as a new and very large competing issuer Ten years of long dated treasury total return below zero while CPI rose 40 to 45%, and what that does to the 60/40 Why TIPS at 2.4% on the ten year and 3% on the thirty look like the better bet 4.5% on the ten year and 5% on the thirty now acting as a floor rather than a ceiling Jonny has spent 25 years trading macro at the highest institutional level. This is not retail speculation or headline chasing. It is rigorous, independent analysis from someone who has sat at the table. New to SuperMacro? Get 30 days of our Daily Note entirely free at www.super-macro.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

  2. Aug 12

    The Yen Intervention Is Smoke and Mirrors

    US payrolls fell by 23,000 in the latest print, with over 100,000 of downward revisions to the previous two months — and yet Treasury yields climbed. When bond markets rally on bad news and then give it all back, something deeper is going on.   Meanwhile, the much-publicised coordinated intervention to support the Japanese yen — complete with a conveniently photographed "buy yen" note on the Treasury Secretary's desk — may be far less than it appears. And with Japanese government bond yields hitting two-decade highs, the pressure on Tokyo is building fast.   Elvis sits down with veteran macro trader Jonny Matthews — 25 years of institutional experience at Brevan Howard and Citigroup — to unpack why the Treasury market shrugged off a weak jobs report, what the US–Japan yen intervention is really designed to achieve, and why the long end of the bond market in both countries is flashing red.   In this episode: Why Treasury yields rose despite a negative payrolls print — and what a shrinking labour supply means for wages and inflation The unemployment rate at a 13-month low of 4.1% even as jobs are lost — the retiring boomers and net-zero migration story the headlines miss Bessent's "whatever it takes" moment: the leaked to-do list, the Exchange Stabilization Fund, and why this intervention is more theatre than firepower   Japan's high nominal GDP playbook — inflating away a 200% debt-to-GDP ratio while JGB yields hit two-decade highs — and the 1992 sterling lesson for anyone defending a currency   Why 4.5% on the 10-year and 5% on the 30-year now look like floors rather than ceilings — and the asymmetric risk around this week's CPI print ahead of September's Fed meeting   Jonny has spent 25 years trading macro at the highest institutional level. This is not retail speculation or headline chasing. It is rigorous, independent analysis from someone who has sat at the table.   New to SuperMacro? Get 30 days of our Daily Note entirely free at www.super-macro.com Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

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SuperMacro provides a summary of the most critical economic and financial news from the major regions, with insights into the impact on markets and policy. We take a detailed look at the fundamentals once a week, highlighting opportunities for tactical trading strategies and longer-term investments.

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