The Market Call - Week Ending 20th June 2025

This week, Progressive's Jeremy McKeown and Gareth Evams discuss the market reaction to Trump's potential intervention in the Israel-Iran conflict, as well as interest-rate "holds" from the US and UK in the face of ongoing inflationary pressure. Japan continues to confuse - and to present major risk - with high inflation and close-to-zero interest rates, while the US/Japan trade deal is still conspicuous by its absence. Progressive client news focussed on one stock, Oxford Metrics, whose H1 results statement highlights H2 weighting along with a skew towards US academia - a market segment clearly under pressure from Trump's defunding of large chunks of US educational budgets. Smart Manufacturing growth will, over time, diversify the group away from these risks, but investors are worrying about the near-term. Following a recent IPO, the UK now has its own version of the US-based Strategy (fka Microstrategy) - a "bitcoin treasury" business known as The Smarter Web Company. The stock has rocketed post its recent float, and Jeremy and Gareth discuss the fact that, from almost all bubbles and collapses, there are persistent changes, and some survivors... Speaking of survivors, Thomas Moore's fund at Aberdeen has now moved to trading at a PREMIUM to its NAV - after a decade of discounts...and the fund is raising new capital. Evidence of green shoots then, both in terms of micro-cap investor risk appetite, and investor perceptions of value at a steady and high-quality long term investment trust. Next week looks quiet - US GDP and inflation data will allow Trump to blame "Too Late Jay" Jerome Powell (and maybe Joe Biden) although clearly events in the Middle East will be key.