Global Investing

Although the focus has been on Spanish debt auctions this week as this chart shows Italy has much further to go in meeting this year’s funding needs.

German business sentiment rose unexpectedly for the fifth month in a row in March, moving in the opposite direction to the composite PMI:

Greg Harrison points out 82% of S&P 500 companies have beaten their Q1 earnings estimates so far. It  is early days but it it continues that would be the highest for at least five years. Is this a sign that the strength in corporate earnings in continuing? The chart below suggests as least part may be due to falling expectations coming into earnings season.

The latest State Street investor confidence index bears some scrutiny. The overall index dropped in February which would seem to be in line with other sentiment indicators such as The Conference Board’s consumer confidence index and the German Ifo on business thinking.

But the State Street  fall was entirely due to bearish Asian sentiment. There were gains in the North American and European regional calculations. Also the overall, North American and European indices all came in above 100 — which means that sentiment remains on the bullish side.

It begs the question of whether Asia is a) lagging b) leading or c) just out there on its own.