Risk of ‘wrathful Old-Testament style’ reaction from central banks is rising, JPMorgan says

On Monday, investors attempted to recover from weeks of volatility driven by a stream of unexpectedly strong U.S. economic data, pushing up expectations for continued rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. All three major U.S. stock indexes
DJIA,
+0.40%

SPX,
+0.56%

COMP,
+0.90%
were looking to rebound after booking weekly losses, while Treasury yields were mixed after 2- and 10-year rates jumped for a fifth straight week and the ICE U.S. Dollar Index
DXY,
-0.49%
was off 0.4%.

Attention now turns to developments later this week. Thursday brings an inflation update from the eurozone, which is expected to set the tone for bond markets, as well as the account of the European Central Bank’s most recent meeting. In the U.S., markets expect the Fed to end up lifting the fed-funds rate target to 5.4%, up from the 5.1% 2023 median forecast of policy makers in December. Deutsche Bank
DB,
+2.30%
remains an outlier, with a call for a 5.6% terminal fed-funds rate.

Over the past year, developed-market central banks have delivered rate hikes of roughly 300 basis points or more each, according to JPMorgan.

The Fed has gone even further by hiking 450 basis points — taking its main policy rate to between 4.5% and 4.75% from almost zero since last March — but opted for a smaller rate hike at its Jan. 31-Feb. 1 meeting, when it hiked by only a quarter point.

“Recent developments suggest this gentle and forgiving path will prove unsuccessful,” Kasman, Lupton and Hanson wrote, in a Friday note. “The risk of triggering a more wrathful Old-Testament style central bank reaction is on the rise. The transmission of the rapid shift in policy still underway also raises the risk of a recession not intended by central banks.”

Traders are bracing for another surge in market volatility by scooping up hedges. NatWest Markets and Nomura
8604,
+1.93%
are now forecasting a half-of-a-percentage point rate hike by the Fed in March, while Ben McLannahan, Sue Ho and Nick Gentle of Barclays
BCS,
+1.82%
said the possibility of one is growing. Researchers at Goldman Sachs
GS,
+0.63%
researchers also see hawkish risks building.

“Asset prices are sensitive to shifting probabilities around recession timing and rate paths,” JPMorgan’s economists said. They’re placing 70% odds on a recession starting in late 2023 or 2024, and a 30% chance on a soft-landing scenario that sees only slowing growth — both of which are conditional upon being able to avoid a near-term downturn.

From there, the economists consider two alternative paths. One is that any recession late this year is concentrated in the U.S., assuming rate hikes end in the second quarter and roughly 500 basis points of tightening works its way through the economy. The second is that resilient growth and elevated inflation force the Fed and central banks in Western Europe to turn more restrictive, with sustained tightening during the second half of the year becoming “a recipe for a deeper recession that starts later and is more synchronized globally.”