Investments  

What negative interest rates could mean for your clients

  • Describe the bank of England's stance on negative interest rates
  • Explain some of the intended consequences of negative interest rates
  • Describe some of the negative consequences of negative interest rates
CPD
Approx.30min

He says the unprecedented financial circumstances mean that potential borrowers are wary of taking on more debt, so the extra economic activity has not happened.  

Gero Jung, chief economist at Mirabaud, based in Switzerland, says his experience of that country is that individuals have not, as policymakers intended, reduced their savings rate and spent more.

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He says the very opposite has happened, as people tend to have a savings goal, and if they are earning nothing in interest, they increase the amount of cash they put into savings accounts. This reduces the amount of spending in the economy, and so growth and inflation remain low.  

While the supply of money in the economy is a factor of the level of growth, the speed at which the money moves through the economy, what economists call the velocity of money, is the second consideration. 

Mr Mac Gorain says inflation would not be something advisers or their clients would have to worry about if negative rates were introduced, as in such an environment, economic growth would be so weak that inflation is a long way off, while the evidence from most of the economies that have negative interest rates is that inflation does not take hold in future. 

The negative rate at which governments can borrow money allows politicians to spend more, this increased level of spending may bring the recession to an end sooner. 

Peter Toogood, chief investment officer at Embark Group, says that in an economy where government spending is an increasing part of GDP, the returns earned by shareholders tend to be lower, while the policy of very low interest rates mean many companies develop pension fund deficits, because the income paid on the bonds held in those funds falls.

Companies then have to put cash into the pension fund, which is cash that is then not available to spend on expanding the company, or paying higher wages. 

Velocity of money

Both of those events slow down the velocity of money in an economy, money in a pension fund is money being spent in the future, rather than now, while wages are cash spent in the short term, so the money has a much greater velocity.

Phil Milburn, bond fund manager at Liontrust says one of the outcomes of a negative interest rate policy is that otherwise unsuccessful companies will always be able to refinance debt, and so stay in business.

Those companies are never successful enough to grant employees pay rises, so while unemployment remains low, so does wage growth, that keeps the velocity of money weak, and inflation and economic growth low, without productivity improvements, the long-term growth rate in an economy becomes permanently lower, and this does not suit assets that grow more when the economy grows.