Rathbone's Smith on stagflation and looming likelihood of recession

Co-CIO at Rathbone IM

Ed Smith, co-CIO at Rathbone Investment Management has warned that Rathbone is now ascribing a 30% probability of a global recession.

While low, he noted that "a few months ago, we were ascribing a 0% chance. So that is a big change and we have reoriented how we are positioned within our equity positioning to take out cyclicality, more defensiveness, more pricing power". The chance of a recession in the UK was even higher though, Smith warned, a "50% chance that the UK, or at least the UK consumer, enters recession". Looking to central banks, he warned: "I do think there is a risk of a policy mistake and a bigger risk of a policy mistake than we have had to deal with for a long time." While Smith said that there ...