Stockholm (Ekonamik) – On the heels of the blowout from the Trump tariff threats, the latest ECB meeting, disappointing US job figures, Danish elections and a new caretaker government in Austria, we peeked into asset managers’ views of real asset markets this week.
Denmark’s Social Democrats became the country’s biggest party in its general election last week, leading to the prospect of power changing hand in the Scandinavian country. However, differences between the four parties in the left-leaning bloc mean that a centrist coalition is a possibility. Following a political scandal involving the junior right-wing populist party in the Austrian coalition government, the country swore in a caretaker government led by Chancellor Brigitte Bierlein who will govern until elections are held in September. Outgoing centre-right chancellor Sebastian Kurz’s chances are looking good.
In economic news, the week was dominated by monetary policy and labour market data. At its June monetary policy meeting, the ECB held rates constant but tried to adjust forward guidance and to incentivise banks to use long term loans to fund real economic activity. Market observers from ING, Danske Bank and Handelsbanken were not very impressed. In the USA, May job figures were extremely disappointing and raised the spectre of Fed rate cuts.
This week, Ekonamik focused on Real Asset Markets, with a particular focus on the retail and real estate. In an interview, Astarte Capital Partners‘ Teresa Farmaki highlighted the rising popularity of real assets within the alternatives space, infrastructure and Astarte’s unique co-investment platform model.
Asset managers highlighted concerns about the viability of the retail sector, which is being pressured by online retail. We also took the opportunity of this thematic focus to consider conditions in the Swedish real estate market, its underlying features and how these echo throughout the economy and people’s housing experiences.
Picture from Pixabay
