Analysen beskriver, at aktiemarkedet er steget meget hurtigt efter en periode med kraftige fald.
Bank of Americas strateg Michael Hartnett mener dog ikke, at det nødvendigvis er starten på en stærk og varig optur. Tværtimod advarer han om, at markedet kan være en “bull trap”, altså en falsk optur, hvor investorer bliver for optimistiske for tidligt.
Samtidig viser kapitalstrømmene, at mange investorer stadig køber aktier, obligationer, guld og krypto, selv om stemningen officielt er mere pessimistisk. Hartnett forventer blandt andet, at inflation og indtjeningsforventninger topper i 2. kvartal, og han foretrækker investeringer i råvarer, Kina, forbrug og en svagere dollar frem for amerikanske obligationer.
Fem konklusioner:
- Markedet er steget usædvanligt hurtigt, og det kan være en falsk optur snarere end starten på en ny stabil fremgang.
- Der er stor forskel på, hvad investorer siger, og hvad de gør: mange er pessimistiske i undersøgelser, men deres penge strømmer stadig ind i risikofyldte aktiver.
- Inflation og renter er stadig den største risiko. Hvis inflationen stiger igen, kan det skabe uro på obligationsmarkedet og presse aktier.
- Hartnett tror ikke mest på amerikanske aktier alene, men ser bedre muligheder i råvarer, Kina, forbrugsaktier og en svagere dollar.
- Forbrugersektoren fremhæves som en spændende kontrær mulighed, fordi den allerede ser ud til at have indregnet meget negativt nyt.
uddrag fra Bank of America
the Bank of America CIO latest Flow Show note titled, appropriately, “Stocksmaxxing” and whether he would take a victory lap.
The answer to the former, is no; instead Hartnett echoes Goldman’s trading desk, and says that with the Nasdaq now up a near record 13 days in a row, the best since July 2009; the XLK tech ETF closing new weekly highs (>$153) and up sharply last week, while the XLF failing its 200-day MA, the market has become “a bull trap.“
To be sure, there are plenty of bulls, because according to the Bank of America strategist, nothing says risk-on more than Aussie dollar (cyclical FX) at highest levels vs. Japanese yen (funding FX) since Oct’90!
More amusingly, Hartnett does what we have been doing since 2022, and pokes fun of the monthly Fund Managers Survey that he himself conducts (also a reason why we have largely been ignoring it in the recent past as it is full of contrarian noise and zero signal), and says that with April 20126 BofA Global Fund Manager Survey representing the most bearish institutional sentiment since Jun’25, flows to the contrary show that 2026 is on track for record year of inflows to both global equities ($1.0tn) & IG bonds ($0.5bn), suggesting that Fund Managers are only good at one thing: lying, and is why even Hartnett now says “watch what they do, not what they say.” Which is a rather awkward thing for Hartnett to say since it is his job to ask the questions and to explain the answers.
And speaking of risk-on flows, we got another burst last week, with $11.3bn flowing into stocks, $7.9bn into bonds, $1.2bn into gold, $1.2bn into crypto, all funded by a record $172.2bn from cash. Here are the details:
- Cash: $172.2bn outflow…largest outflow ever (risk-on but also tax-related…average April cash outflow was $41bn past 4 years vs. $103bn this year),
- HY debt: $3.1bn inflow…largest since May’25,
- Treasuries: $3.0bn outflow…1st outflow in 11 weeks,
- EM stocks: $10.5bn outflow…largest outflow in 11 weeks,
- Europe stocks: $4.7bn outflow…largest since Nov’24
- Stocks: $11.3bn inflow, driven by $17.4bn inflow to US equities,
- Japan: $4.4bn outflow…largest since Nov’25
- China: $10.8bn outflow…largest in 11 weeks,
- Korea: $2.5bn outflow…largest ever,
- Tech: $3.8bn outflow…largest since May’25
How are the bearish and bullish camps responding to the current near-record market meltup? Well, according to Bank of America, the macro bears are confident that one “can’t buy risk until inflation peaks” which is definitely not now, since the risk is that in Q2 oil is up, CPI is up, yields are up and we get a bond tantrum a la ’13, ’15, ’22, ’23…
….on a combo of surprise reacceleration of labor market, geopolitically weak US dollar, and pressure for Warsh to start dovish (in the 3 months after the start of 7 new Fed chair terms, yields rose by 50bps on average ).
Meanwhile, the bulls say “so long as yields & unemployment in 4-5% range we gucci”… furthermore S&P EPS on course for >$330 justifies new highs.
Just as importantly, as he said last week, stocks are much better than bonds as policymakers placate electorates with strong nominal GDP growth, while both Gen QE & Gen Z know stock market “too big to fail”.
So what does Hartnett think… besides the obvious implication from his Zeitgeist quote – “You see SEC ending $25k minimum for day trading…if only there were signs” – suggesting that regulator will do everything for one last retail-driven push higher in risk. As the BofA strategist concludes his last note, his expectations are that:
- Both CPI & EPS expectations will peak in Q2;
- 2-year Treasury yield won’t break 4%,
- 2s30s UST yield curve bull steepens to >140bps,
- US$ DXY index hits new lows (<96),
- China Shanghai index makes run to 4.5k,
- Consumer discretionary beats energy in Q2.
How is the BofA Investment strategist trading it?
- Buy Curve steepeners: hard to pass through higher oil prices when consumers are frustrated on affordability (Trump approval inflation new low <33%) and are insecure about AI job replacement; that’s why the macro says cuts not hikes (US small biz capex intentions slump to Dec’09 lows)…
… US rate expectations (max dovish 125bps cuts in Oct, max hawkish 20bps hikes in March, now 5bps cuts) to fall further.
- Sell US Dollar: tariffs, threats end NATO, OPEC petrodollar recycling – there is a US dollar buyers strike as low appetite for more US assets (foreigners own $20tn US stocks, $10tn US Treasuries, $5tn US corporate bonds) to fund $39tn of US debt and its $1.2tn annual debt servicing cost; Fed pressure to cut grow; in sum, US policymakers will trade weaker dollar rather than higher bond yields to attract foreign capital.
- Buy Commodities (picking up where he ended last week): commodities > stocks > bonds U S$ secular asset return pecking order… commodities…risk hedge for allocators, inflation hedge for allocators, US$ bear market hedge for allocators, plus geopolitics now driven by need to monopolize commodities, or as Hartnett put it, “who owns the chips, rare earths, minerals, oil, wins the AI war.”
- Buy China: biggest equity winners since Trump inauguration are US-China AI war winners (US semis, Asia tech, Canada/LatAm materials), and here the China tech stocks are catching up bigly: the ChiNext index is breaking out…
… and China tech exports up 43% YoY (to $234bn);
Chinese yuan vs. Japanese yen highest since Aug’92, vs. Korean won highest since Feb’09, and China has plenty of energy to power AI (alternative energy, Russian oil).
- Buy Consumer: US consumer discretionary at Lehman 2008 & COVID 2020 relative lows (equal-weighted); global consumer discretionary at 3-year lows vs energy stocks; this suggests that the consumer has priced in stagflation more than any other sector, which is why it is Hartnett’s favorite contrarian long to trade Trump post-war pivot to address affordability & slump in approval ratings, and a great way to hedge H2’2020s electoral shift from “populist capitalism” to “populist socialism”.
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