Forbes Indonesia Magazine - May 2022

In this issue

Those who have worked in tight roof spaces know the dangers of stepping off the joists and onto the rafters. It’s an analogy of the situation which now faces the Federal Reserve and Central Banks as they need to tread carefully to balance the inflationary pressures resulting from a long period of low interest rates fuelling borrowings and debt, two years of accommodative monetary policy to fight the pandemic and now the global disruption on key commodities caused by the ongoing war in Ukraine, all whilst supply chains and economic activity were earlier on track for a positive recovery as we entered 2022. With spiralling inflation now seen as a significant near-term risk, the Fed has just announced the largest single interest rate hike in 20 years and signalled the intention to raise rates a further seven times before the end of the year. With commodity prices across energy, metals and food all running at or near 12-month highs the possibility of a recession, or at least stunted growth, when expectations were much more positive just 4 months ago, is real. With the US Government Debt level breaching $30 trillion and the war in Ukraine giving rise to more spending requests, the question of when the current debt ceiling of $31.4 trillion may be reached starts to come into view. With the coming US mid-term elections having so much riding on them for both main parties, it’s hard to see easy compromises being reached, with a potential further jolt to confidence in the markets.