Macro Hive Conversations With Bilal Hafeez

Shahraab Ahmad On New York Real Estate, Corporate Fraud And SPACs

August 21, 2020 15:45 - 50 minutes - 49 MB

In this episode, I talk with Shahraab Ahmad. Shahraab was previously the Chief Investment Officer of the credit fund Decca Capital. Prior to launching the fund in 2015, he managed the Hutchin Hill Liquid Credit Strategy (2008-2013). From 2005 to 2008, he was a partner at Sailfish Capital, where he traded global relative value within credit, and prior to that, he was Co-Head of the HY Credit Trading Group at J.P. Morgan (1999-2004). In this podcast we discuss: The early years of CDS trading ...

Stephen Roach On The Dollar’s Coming 35% Decline

August 14, 2020 17:11 - 38 minutes - 34.7 MB

In this episode, I talk with Stephen Roach. Stephen is well known for his 30-year stint at Morgan Stanley, where he was Chairman of Morgan Stanley Asia and Chief Economist. He’s currently a Senior Fellow at Yale University’s Jackson Institute of Global Affairs and a Senior Lecturer at Yale’s School of Management. At Yale, he has introduced new courses on “The Next China” and “The Lessons of Japan.”. He’s an author too with his recent book published in 2014, which is called Unbalanced: The Co...

Governor Dr Reza Baqir On Pakistan’s FX Reforms, Inflation Fight And Crisis Management

August 10, 2020 11:00 - 1 hour - 59.6 MB

In this episode, I talk with Governor Dr Reza Baqir who became the 20th Governor of the State Bank of Pakistan in May 2019. He took the helm as Pakistan embarked on an ambitious reform plan which included an IMF programme. Before that, he was an 18-year veteran of the IMF and previously also worked at the World Bank. He was the Head of the IMF's Office in Egypt and Senior Resident Representative from 2017 to 2019. He has also held positions as IMF Mission Chief for Romania and Bulgaria, Divi...

John Llewellyn On The Challenge Of Returning To Pre-COVID Output, MMT And Climate Change

August 04, 2020 13:19 - 46 minutes - 36 MB

In this episode, I talk with John Llewellyn. John is the co-founder of Llewellyn Consulting – a leading independent economic advisory firm. Before setting up the firm in 2009, John had various research roles including being the Global Chief Economist at Lehman Brothers, Head of International Forecasting and Policy Analysis at the OECD and teaching at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Cambridge. In this podcast, we discuss: Forget talks of V-, W-shaped recoveries, it will take ye...

Edward Misrahi On Decluttering Your Investment Process, EM Crises, And Current Risks

July 31, 2020 17:19 - 46 minutes - 44.3 MB

In this episode, I talk with Edward Misrahi. Edward is the CIO and Founder of Ronit Capital – a leading emerging markets focused hedge fund. He founded the fund in 2013, before that he was a founding partner of Eton Park Capital. Edward started his career at Goldman Sachs – where amongst other things he worked in the famous Risk Arbitrage group and later become a partner. In this podcast we discuss: The 1994 Mexico crisis and learning how to buy distressed assets The 1997-1998 Asia/Russia...

Professor Justin Stebbing On Expecting A COVID Vaccine Before The US Election

July 24, 2020 20:11 - 33 minutes - 35.1 MB

In this episode, I talk with Professor Justin Stebbing. He is a professor in the Faculty of Medicine at Imperial college London. He initially trained at Oxford, before having a residency at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in the US, then returned to the UK to work at the Royal Marsden, Barts and now Imperial. He specializes in cancers and immunotherapies. He has an extensive research background having published over 550 peer-reviewed papers. He recently published in the Lancet new research on us...

Samm Sacks On The US-China Data War, TikTok And EU Data Sovereignty

July 17, 2020 13:48 - 26 minutes - 28.3 MB

In this episode, I talk with Samm Sacks. She is a Cybersecurity Policy and China Digital Economy Fellow at New America. Her research focuses on emerging information and communication technology (ICT) policies globally, particularly in China. She has worked on Chinese technology policy issues for over a decade, both with the U.S. government and in the private sector. She recently testified before Congress on data security issues between the US and China. In this podcast we discuss: Why data ...

Raghuram Rajan On Why MMT, Authoritarianism And Bailouts Won’t Work

July 10, 2020 16:12 - 35 minutes - 32.2 MB

This episode is sponsored by SGX – the largest Asian FX exchange. In this episode, I talk with Raghuram Rajan. He is currently Professor of Finance at Chicago Booth. Before that, he was the 23rd Governor of the Reserve Bank of India between September 2013 and September 2016. Between 2003 and 2006, Dr. Rajan was the Chief Economist and Director of Research at the IMF. He’s the author of several books – most recently, the excellent “The Third Pillar: How the State and Markets are leaving Com...

Chris Crowe On End Of Safe Asset Shortage

July 02, 2020 17:27 - 40 minutes - 35.1 MB

In this episode, I talk with Chris Crowe. Chris is Head of Economic & Flow Research at one of the world’s leading hedge funds, Capula Investment Management. He was previously UK Economist at Barclays for two years and prior to that, worked at the IMF for five years. He has also published in top economic journals. In this podcast we discuss: Why bond yields have trended down in recent decades The role of safe assets in this downtrend Likely shifts in the supply and demand of safe assets ...

Saeed Amen On Trading Models, Alternative Data And Python

June 26, 2020 19:07 - 35 minutes - 33.9 MB

In this episode, I talk with Saeed Amen. He is the founder of Cuemacro, which provides investors with quant research and analysis. Over the past fifteen years, Saeed has developed systematic trading strategies at major investment banks, including Lehman Brothers and Nomura. He is also the author of “Trading Thalesians: What the ancient world can teach us about trading today” and is the coauthor of “The Book of Alternative Data”, which is due out later this year. He is also a visiting lecture...

Lord Mervyn King On The Wrong Use Of Monetary Policy In A Radically Uncertain World

June 19, 2020 15:25 - 26 minutes - 23.9 MB

In this episode, I talk with Lord Mervyn King. He needs no introduction, except to say he is one of the leading figures in central banking over the past few decades. He served for ten years as the Governor of the Bank of England, which included dealing with the 2008 financial crisis. He’s written a number of books including the recent bestseller with co-author John Kay “Radical Uncertainty: Decision-making Beyond the Numbers”. Here’s what we talk about: Defining uncertainty - difference bet...

Dominique Dwor-Frecaut On The V-Shaped Recovery And Return Of Inflation

June 12, 2020 18:55 - 34 minutes - 31 MB

In this episode, I talk with Dominique Dwor-Frecaut. She’s an accomplished macro thinker that has worked at leading hedge fund Bridgewater, the NY Fed and the IMF. She’s also been an early advocate for a V-shaped recovery. We covered lots on the podcast including: 1. Why a V-shaped recovery is likely 2. The panic pandemic 3. How productivity could jump after COVID 4. What could see inflation rise 5. How income inequality is distorting the economy 6. The coming backlash against monopol...

Professor Alex Edmans on How Great Companies Deliver Both Purpose And Profit

June 05, 2020 20:41 - 49 minutes - 47.4 MB

In this episode, I talk with Professor Alex Edmans from the London Business School. He’s one of the world’s leading academics on company purpose, social value and profits. In fact, he’s just come out with a book on the subject called “Grow the Pie: How Great Companies Deliver Both Purpose and Profit”. We covered lots on the podcast including: 1. Is a company’s sole purpose to deliver profits? 2. How markets do not correctly price in social value in the short-term 3. The problem with rest...

Emiel Van Den Heiligenberg On Leaning Against The Rally

May 29, 2020 19:34 - 42 minutes - 39.5 MB

In this episode, I talk with Emiel Van Den Heiligenberg. He is the Head of Asset Allocation at one the world’s largest asset managers, Legal and General. His fund is one of the fastest growing multi-asset funds and has been a top quartile performer over the last five years. In his own word, Emiel replaced rowing with French Fries, but has continued to instill the teamwork from his rowing team into his investment team. We covered lots on the podcast including: 1. Why markets have recently r...

Alfonso Prat-Gay On How To Save Emerging Countries

May 22, 2020 11:21 - 58 minutes - 39.3 MB

In this episode, I talk with Alfonso Prat-Gay. He was Governor of the central bank of Argentina from 2002 to 2004 and later Argentina’s Finance Minister between 2015-2016. I had the pleasure of working under Alfonso during my J.P Morgan days in the late 1990s, and I hold him up to be one of my most influential mentors. We also have a scoop about Alfonso and the Bank of England. On the podcast, we cover a very wide range of topics including: 1. The pre-COVID global trends from the US’s in...

Juliette Declercq On Why Equities Are Not Overvalued

May 15, 2020 13:35 - 28 minutes - 19.8 MB

In this episode, I talk markets with Juliette Declercq. She’s a leading macro strategist and runs JDI research. She has close to twenty years market experience, including stints at J.P Morgan, Morgan Stanley and Stone Milliner. On the podcast, we discuss: 1. Why using past recessions is not a guide to the COVID crisis 2. Why P/E ratios are a poor guide to equity valuation 3. Not putting too much weight on weak employment data 4. Why Euro-area break-up trades are not attractive 5. Her...

Bobby Vedral On Euro Area Tensions, Brexit And US Elections

May 07, 2020 22:30 - 41 minutes - 94.2 MB

In this episode, I talk politics and markets with Bobby Vedral. He’s a top macro and political analyst who runs Macro Eagle. He is also the UK representative of the German Economic Council, which focuses on the German-British relationship post-Brexit. Before that Bobby was at Goldman Sachs, where he was a partner and Global Head of Market Strats. On the podcast, we discuss: 1. The structural consequences of the COVID crisis 2. What the stress points are for the Euro-area and which count...

Martin Wolf On The Scale Of The COVID Crisis, Future Debt Problems And US Isolationism

May 01, 2020 14:12 - 1 hour - 158 MB

In this episode, I have a wide-ranging conversation with the FT’s Chief Economics Commentator, Martin Wolf. He brings a depth to any topic that is often lacking anywhere else. On the podcast, we discuss: 1. The parallels of the COVID crisis with past crises such as the ones seen in the 1970s 2. The uniqueness of this crisis 3. How well policymakers have done so far 4. The role of international organisations and US hegemony 5. The challenge for EM countries 6. How China will be viewed ...

Alex Gurevich On The Eternal Appeal Of Bonds, Fed’s Path To Zero And The Europe Bull Case

April 23, 2020 19:48 - 31 minutes - 71.9 MB

In this episode, I have a conversation with the super-smart and provocative thinker and investor, Alex Gurevich. In our wide-ranging chat, we discuss recent lessons learned, views on markets and risks to look out for. Specifically: 1. How not to become attached to one asset class or investment style. 2. How every crisis delivers something you’ve never seen before 3. Why crisis moments are when you should take most risk. 4. Why bonds can still be attractive even when yields are low 5. H...

Jim Leitner On The Dollar, Equities And The Economy Of Bits And Things

April 16, 2020 23:55 - 50 minutes - 115 MB

In this episode, I have a conversation with one of the top macro investors that I’ve come across, Jim Leitner. He has an impressive track-record, but more importantly, is very thoughtful and can go from talking about the nuts and bolts of options trading to how political regimes change. In the podcast, we talk about: How not to become attached to one asset class or investment style Whether options are over-priced The path of the dollar Which companies and sectors will succeed in the C...

Phil Suttle On V-Shaped Recoveries, Inflation And Euro Break-Up Risks

April 10, 2020 11:16 - 41 minutes - 95 MB

In this episode, I have a conversation with one of my favourite global economists, Phil Suttle. He’s got the credentials having worked at J.P. Morgan, the Fed, World Bank, Barclays and Tudor, but it’s his analysis that stands out. In the podcast, we talk about: (1) How to forecast growth when economies lock-down. (2) Whether the policy responses so far will make a difference and how Asia is behaving differently. (3) The chances of a second-half recovery. (4) How the world will look a...

John Butler On Why Gold Could Go To $5,000

April 03, 2020 13:24 - 39 minutes - 89.9 MB

In this episode, I have a conversation with one of the leading experts on gold, John Butler. He has spent 25 years in the financial industry, worked at some of the top banks and has even written a book on gold (The Golden Revolution). In the podcast, we talk about: Valuation frameworks for gold The relationship between oil and real interest rates with gold The insurance properties of gold How gold behaves around regime changes in political and monetary systems Comparisons between go...

An Original Take On The COVID Crisis – Time As A Symptom

March 27, 2020 17:43 - 44 minutes - 102 MB

In this episode, we’re lucky to have a conversation with one of the most original macro thinkers, the Macro Dilettante. He prefers not to disclose his name, but I’ve known him for years and is a super experienced market pro having worked at asset managers, in alternative investments and at pension funds. Back in January, he warned me about the global consequences of COVID and I mistakenly didn’t heed his advice until much later. During our conversation, we talk about the importance of unde...

George Goncalves On Whether The Fed Can Save Markets

March 20, 2020 17:30 - 28 minutes - 65.6 MB

With the country in lockdown, we’ve decided to launch a podcast show to better reach our audience. In our inaugural episode, I speak to George Goncalves about the recent volatility in markets, what’s going in dollar cash markets, what the Fed can do and whether we could enter a depression. I also review some of the pieces we’ve put out on Macro Hive over the past week including ones on tracking the COVID virus, the odds of a US recession, the importance of real yields and the possibility o...

Intro episode

March 15, 2020 15:02 - 4 minutes - 5.7 MB

As everyone enters lock-down, we'll be working remotely and using our new podcast show to talk to our audience