(Bloomberg) -- Interest-rate strategists at Citigroup Inc. say the Federal Reserve should pause its interest-rate cuts, further isolating the bank’s economists, who’ve stuck with a call for a half-point move in December long after others on Wall Street abandoned it.
“We believe that the Fed should put easing on hold, barring weak payrolls data in December,” strategists Jabaz Mathai and Alejandra Vazquez said in a Nov. 22 report, referring to the US employment report for November slated to be released on Dec. 6. And even if job creation is weak, “it can be argued that other labor market data such as jobless claims are indicating a resilient labor market.”
The strategists recommended that investors position for a pause by the Fed next month by paying the rate on the overnight index swap contract corresponding to the Fed’s December rate decision. They first endorsed the trade on Nov. 5 when the rate was 4.404%, and it has since climbed to about 4.46%, at which level it prices in just under 50% odds of a quarter-point rate cut.
The caveat, they wrote: “This is a dovish Fed and the threshold to skip is high.”
Meanwhile, Citi economists are holding out for a half-point Fed rate cut in December — while acknowledging that the odds have faded.
While soft November jobs data would allow the Fed to cut rates by a half-point, if the US unemployment rates holds steady at 4.1% rather than rising, a quarter-point cut is likelier, the economists Andrew Hollenhorst and Veronica Clark said in reports this month.
The Fed cut interest rates by a half point on Sept. 18 at a point when Wall Street was divided on whether policymakers would opt for a quarter-point move instead for their first reduction in years. By the time they followed it up with a quarter-point move on Nov. 7 amid signs of economic resilience, economists at Bank of America Corp. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. had scrapped calls for another half-point cut this year.
Bond investors more broadly have pared wagers on how much Fed easing can be expected over the next year. In addition to strong performance by the US economy and stock market, the Nov. 5 presidential election of Donald Trump stoked wagers that inflation could re-accelerate. OIS contracts linked to next year’s Fed meetings are priced for about 73 basis points of cuts over the next 12 months to a level of about 3.86%. As recently as early October the expected rate was under 3%.
Citi’s economists expect the November jobs report to show job creation short of 150,000, compared with a median forecast of 220,000 in Bloomberg’s survey. For the Fed to pause in December would require job growth of at least 300,000 and an increase in November core consumer prices of at least 0.35%, they said.
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