The author has been described by News Ltd as an "iconoclast", "Svengali", a pollie's "economist muse", and "pungently accurate". Fairfax says he is a "Renaissance man" and "one of Australia’s most respected analysts." Stephen Koukoulas concludes that he is "85% right", and "would make a great Opposition leader." Terry McCrann claims the author thinks "‘nuance’ is a trendy village in the south of France", but can be "scintillating" when he thinks "clearly". The ACTU reckons he’s "an enigma wrapped in a Bloomberg terminal, wrapped in some apparently well-honed abs."

Tuesday, September 21, 2010

Ex RBA economist, Paul Bloxham, calls five rate hikes by end 2011

After spending 12 years at the RBA, the very highly regarded Paul Bloxham has just been appointed Chief Economist of HSBC in Australia & NZ, replacing the well-respected John Edwards.

Bloxham worked in the economic analysis group at the RBA, and was presumably at the heart of the monetary policy setting process.

In the very first research note he has published, Bloxham has made a remarkably bullish rates call, predicting a total of five future rate hikes over 2010-11. He is also forecasting GDP growth in 2010 of 3.4%, which he thinks will accelerate to 4.1% in 2011.

Bloxham comments, "the RBA is not done yet: we expect another 25bp hike in 4Q and 100bp in 2011, bringing the rate to 5.75% by end-2011."
at 10:43 AM