Yesterday’s post cited improved investor sentiment as a reason for near-term caution on prospects for equities and other risk assets. A change in positioning as sentiment has shifted from excessive pessimism in late summer 2012 to moderate optimism now has been a key driver of recent market strength.

Equity hedge funds, in particular, now appear to have relatively high market exposure, suggesting that other investor groups will need to take up the baton if recent gains are to be extended. Exposure can be estimated by examining the sensitivity of the HFRX daily equity hedge return index to the MSCI World index. The beta measured over a 30-day rolling window rose from 0.13 in September 2012 to 0.48 last week – not far from a peak of 0.54 reached in June 2011 before a big decline in stocks.

The suggestion of bullish hedge fund positioning is supported by the latest Merrill Lynch survey, showing weighted net equity exposure of 45%, a seven-year high.

The indicators followed here were giving a positive signal for equities and other risk assets in late summer 2012:

• Global real narrow money expansion was rising, suggesting an economic pick-up from late 2012 – see here.

• A global “double-lead” indicator calculated here from OECD country leading indicator data had turned up, supporting the monetary forecast – here.

• A large gap had opened up between global real money expansion and industrial output growth, implying “excess” liquidity available to flow into markets.

• Central banks were easing policies and signalling more to come

• Investors were unduly pessimistic about economic prospects and positioned defensively.

The current message from the same indicators is more ambiguous:

• Global real money growth has moderated since late 2012 though remains at a level historically consistent with solid economic expansion.

• The double-lead indicator has also declined – see below.

• Global real money expansion remains above output growth but the gap has narrowed, suggesting a less favourable – but not unfavourable – liquidity backdrop.

• Central banks are still easing but may scale back further stimulus in response to better economic news and market buoyancy.

• Many but not all investors are optimistic and constructively positioned.

The judgement here, therefore, is that a reduction in exposure to equities and other risk assets is warranted currently and a shift to defence should be considered if the real money / output growth gap closes.

The global double-lead indicator fell further in March and is starting to diverge negatively from real money expansion – see chart. Real money has led recent industrial cycle turning points by an average of six months; the indicator has led by five months. The forecasting approach here places greater weight on monetary trends but both measures suggest that the acceleration phase of the cycle – during which equities typically do best – is ending.

Posts since last summer (e.g. here) argued that the Eurozone economy would bottom out in autumn 2012 and revive into 2013, based on a recovery in real narrow money from spring 2012. Economic improvement has been held back by an unwarranted appreciation of the euro – driven by US / Japanese devaluationist policies – but is now evident in industrial output data.

Output for the first quarter as a whole was up by 0.2% from the fourth quarter, while March’s reading was 1.4% above a trough reached in November. The six-month change has recovered to zero and should turn positive in April / May, rising further during the second half in lagged response to faster real money expansion – see chart.

Consistent with country-level monetary developments, the recovery to date has been led by Germany and the Netherlands, with output falling further in France, Italy and Spain in the first quarter.

As previously discussed, recent much-improved monetary trends across the periphery suggest a stabilisation in output in the second quarter followed by a second-half recovery. Germany should continue to lead the upswing but France should underperform and Dutch prospects have deteriorated.

Chinese monetary trends continue to suggest a dull economic outlook. Japanese trends suggest modest economic improvement.

Six-month growth in Chinese real narrow money M1 has been broadly stable since mid-2012 at slightly below the long-run average – see first chart. Weakness in 2011 and the first half of 2012 correctly foreshadowed a significant economic slowdown. Current growth is consistent with stable but slightly below-par economic expansion – in line with the official goal.

Chinese real broad money M2 is rising faster but, as in other countries, the narrow measure appears to be more closely correlated with future spending. The consensus focuses on M2 and credit measures, partly explaining recent overoptimism about economic prospects.

Six-month growth rates of Japanese real M1 and M3 have firmed over the past year but remain within recent historical ranges and are unexceptional by international standards – second chart. A significant further pick-up may be needed to support expectations of faster economic expansion implied by current stock prices.

UK quoted mortgage rates were little changed in April but rates offered on new fixed-rate bonds continued to plunge, according to Bank of England data released today. Banks, in other words, continue to widen margins.

Two-year fixed-rate bonds now offer only 1.90%, down from 3.24% in June 2012, just before the introduction of the funding for lending scheme. The decline of 1.34 percentage points (pp) compares with reductions of 1.00 and 0.87 pp in rates on two-year fixed-rate mortgages at 90% and 75% loan-to-value (LTV) respectively – see first chart.

Margins have also widened on floating-rate products. The average standard variable rate has actually risen by 0.12 pp since June 2012, even though banks are paying 0.57 pp less on instant-access deposits offering a bonus.

Wider bank margins are desirable to strengthen balance sheets and support future lending but the punishment being meted out to savers – with official approval – is brutal.

The second chart shows that a yawning gap has opened up between the dividend yield on the FTSE all-share index and the rate on two-year fixed-rate bonds. Retail buying of equity funds, unsurprisingly, has picked up, though currently remains modest: IMA figures show a net inflow of £3.8 billion in the six months to March, up from £800 million in the prior half-year.

Rather than “flatlining”, the British economy has been regaining momentum since late 2011. This trend is obscured in official GDP statistics by various special factors – North Sea production weakness, an extra bank holiday and the Olympics. Adjusting for their effects, the quarterly change in output has risen from -0.1% in the fourth quarter of 2011 to 0.0%, 0.1%, 0.2%, 0.2% and 0.3% in the first quarter of 2013 – a clear upward trend.

Recent numbers, moreover, probably understate economic improvement because official first estimates of growth tend to be revised up during recovery periods. Quarterly GDP changes since the start of 2009 have already been revised by an average of +0.15%. So the current estimate of a 0.3% increase in underlying output in the first quarter of 2013 may reflect “true” expansion of about 0.5%.

The recent growth revival is no surprise to economists of a “monetarist” persuasion. The Friedmanite rule is that the real or inflation-adjusted money supply leads demand and activity by about six months. Economic weakness in 2011 was foreshadowed by a contraction from mid-2010 in real broad money, as measured by non-financial M4, comprising physical cash and sterling deposits held by households and non-financial firms. The six-month change in real money, however, turned positive in late 2011 and rose further in early 2012, signalling a stronger economy from the second half.

Why has real money growth revived? Part of the story is a slowdown in inflation after a 2011 spike driven by a combination of higher VAT, strong global commodity prices and the lagged impact of exchange rate weakness.

Nominal money trends, however, have also improved, despite continued weakness in bank lending. This may partly reflect the Bank of England’s QE programme but, interestingly, the recovery began before gilt purchases were restarted in October 2011. QE may have had a much smaller impact than the Bank claims: its operations may have substituted for gilt purchases by banks, which were under strong pressure to raise their liquidity ratios – such buying has similar monetary effects. QE has boosted banks’ reserves, allowing them to meet liquidity targets without expanding their gilt holdings.

A less-discussed reason for faster money growth is the effort by banks to restructure their liabilities to reduce reliance on non-deposit and overseas funding. The repayment of such funding can lead to an expansion of domestic deposits included in the money supply. An example would be an overseas investor using funds returned by a UK bank to buy a UK corporate bond at issue – a fall in banks’ overseas liabilities would then be matched by a rise in corporate deposits. The ongoing shift in bank funding sources may partly explain why money growth has remained solid despite the suspension of QE in November 2012.

Real non-financial M4 rose at an annualised rate of 2.1% in the six months to March. The composition of growth is encouraging, with strength focused on cash and instant-access deposits – these components, which constitute narrow money M1, are more likely to be related to future spending. Real non-financial M1 increased by 5.4% annualised in the latest six months.

Sectorally, corporate money holdings are expanding faster than those of households. Corporate liquidity has a closer relationship with the economic cycle – similar increases historically have presaged stronger investment and hiring, with a resulting rise in wage incomes lifting consumer spending.

Some commentators claim that companies are holding more money because of a lack of profitable investment opportunities and as a precaution against cash flow problems, given the difficulty of accessing bank credit. It is certainly plausible that the desired ratio of bank deposits to borrowing has risen as a result of the recession and more restrictive credit conditions. The actual ratio, however, has climbed by more than two-fifths in the four years since the economy bottomed, reaching a new high in data extending back to 1998 – this is unlikely to be fully explained by rising precautionary liquidity demand.

There is, moreover, no sign of any breakdown in the relationship between corporate money growth and the economy. The “soft patch” in 2011 was preceded by a contraction of real corporate liquidity. Recent economic improvement has occurred on schedule following a liquidity revival in 2012.  Six-month growth in real corporate M4 holdings was 5.7% annualised in March and reached 7.9% in January – the highest since 2007.

Monetarist optimism on economic prospects contrasts with “creditist” pessimism, based on the idea that a pick-up in bank lending is a precondition of stronger growth. This notion, however, is at odds with historical evidence that, while money leads the economic cycle, credit is a coincident or lagging indicator. In the US, the Conference Board includes bank business loans and consumer credit in its lagging economic index.

This lagging relationship suggests that bank lending will revive as growth continues to strengthen during 2013. There are already hopeful signs, such as a rise in unused sterling credit facilities in the six months to March – the first such increase since 2007. A credit pick-up, in turn, would provide additional support for monetary expansion.

The monetary foundations for a sustainable economic recovery are in place. The Bank of England should avoid further policy experimentation and focus on achieving its inflation target while allowing banks to operate in a stable regulatory environment.