Conflict in Sudan

The Economist is leading with the War in Sudan and why the conflict is “the world’s problem”. According to the Journal, as many as 150,000 people could have been killed and 10m people forced to leave their homes. Such devastation is, in part, being fuelled by outside powers, including the UAE, Iran, Egypt, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Qatar amongst others.

The ongoing conflict in Sudan is also pushing more and more people into starvation with farmland and crops being burned across the country. In May the Dutch think-tank, the Clingendael Institute, warned that there could be between 6m-10m excess deaths by 2027 as a result of the crisis.

It’s now been over 16-months since the latest civil war in Sudan reignited violence across the fragile the Northeast African state. On the 15 April 2023, violence erupted between two armed factions of the Sudanese government, with the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) locked in a violent power struggle ever since.

Last April, the RSF attacked state infrastructure under the control of SAF and put pressure on the de facto leader of Sudan, Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, to resign. Fighting erupted in the capital Khartoum as well as other urban metropolises like Omdurman with both the SAF and RSF taking control of different areas of the respective cities.

With the RSF successfully capturing government building across Khartoum, the RSF and al-Burhan set up a temporary base in Port Sudan to the Northeast of the country. The ensuing conflict has seen smaller factions join ether the SAF or RSF.

The conflict in Sudan is the latest example of the fragility the country which has seen no less than 15 military coups since its independence from Britain and Egypt in 1956. Given its “porous borders” with seven “fragile states”, the impact that the humanitarian disaster is having and could continue to have on the wider region is hard to understate.

According to the United Nations since the conflict erupted last April it has “pushed millions to the brink of famine” with the price of basic food items rising 83% given critical infrastructure being destroyed and farmlands being deserted.

According to Reuters, ECB policy makers are “increasingly at odds on the outlook for growth” highlighting the division between Hawks and Doves.

Next Thursday will see the ECB make their latest interest rate decision. Following the Central Bank’s July cut (which eased rates from record highs after nine consecutive months), and their subsequent hold in August, it is widely expected that Frankfurt will cut 25bps on the 12th.

This comes as Eurozone CPI dropped 0.4 percentage points to 2.2% in August, hitting its lowest level since July 2021, giving Eurozone Hawks some comfort. For Doves, growth concerns – particularly in Germany – have also compounded pressure on the ECB to loosen monetary policy, with data last week indicating that the largest economy in the Eurozone contracted 0.1% between Q1 and Q2 24.

Nevertheless, the Eurozone labour market continues to appear robust, with Hawks considering how wage growth is above levels consistent with bringing inflation down to 2%.

Markets will therefore be keeping a close eye on Eurozone GDP (6th September) as well as the string of PMIs tomorrow in order to get further insight into the health of the currency union, and the extent to which this could impact policy makers.

This morning will see the release of Swiss CPI and GDP as markets look for further insight into the health of the country, and its impact on the SNB’s monetary policy moving forward.

Data from the Swiss Federal Statistical Office indicated that headline inflation eased held firm at 1.3% over the course of July. Along with June’s, this marked the lowest level of inflation since March, when inflation fell to 1%.

In June, the Swiss National Bank voted to cut their benchmark policy rate by a further 25bps to 1.25%. The SNB’s decision marked their second 25bps cut this year, and the first major central bank to have conducted two cuts.

Following the release of today’s data, attention now turns to the SNB Interest Rate Decision on 26 September.

August sunshine boosted consumer spending by a whole percentage point, compared to a year earlier, according to Barclays.  The increase in spending was largely in groceries, as people took to the great outdoors to enjoy barbecues and picnics. The sunshine also dragged gardening and clothing sales higher too.

The number was a welcome relief from other summer month data, which had shown declines in June and July. Analysts are reading into the numbers and suggesting that they point to the consumer lending strong support to the economy over the second half of this year. Growth is expected to hit 1.25% this year, which could be a better performance than France, Germany and Italy.

Staying in the UK; there’s gathering headlines around ‘pay per mile’ road tax being a way for the government to make up a shortfall in fuel duty that is coming down the line as people migrate to electric vehicles. EV’s will be subject to road tax from 2025, but current fuel duty rates means that 53p from every litre of petrol and diesel sold goes to the exchequer, as the proportion of combustion engine cars reduce, so forecasters expect tax receipts to fall by £5bn a year between 2028 and 2033.

There are plenty of big voices behind the campaign, most notably the RAC, who believe the government need to get on with planning for such a scheme sooner rather than later. The idea though isn’t new, and it is a bit of a political hot potato. However, with such a large majority and multiple declarations that the UK public finances are in a dire state, this might be the least worst time to act.

With the US on holiday yesterday, markets were broadly quiet, and the overnight Asian session hasn’t done much to accelerate things. The dollar was on the front foot first thing, but that has unwound a little bit and we’re pretty much where we were yesterday.

Markets will have to get back in their groove pretty quickly though as the next few days see a deluge of PMI and jobs data from across the world, though the main highlight will be Friday’s payrolls number.