World

Complementing previous data additions from Drewry Shipping Consultants, we’ve just added prices for air freight from twelve international airports, including Singapore, Shanghai, Seoul, Paris, New York, Miami, Los Angeles, London, Hong Kong, Frankfurt, Chicago, and Amsterdam. Given that several routes are available for each airport, this adds up to 143 new time series. 

Air freight buy rates are defined by the source as monthly averages of rates “paid by forwarders to airlines for standard deferred airport-to-airport air freight services” for cargoes of 1,000 kilograms or more, expressed in USD per kilogram. They include three components: a base rate, a fuel surcharge and a security surcharge, while excluding “door delivery” costs.

In the chart below, we focused on freight rates from Shanghai (PVG) airport to various developed markets. We see that after two years of price pressures, buy rates decreased throughout 2022, approaching their pre-pandemic band. 

United Kingdom‍

We’ve added a new survey measuring consumer sentiment regarding the UK property market: the BSA Property Tracker, published by the UK Building Societies Association. More information on the methodology can be accessed here.

In the first chart below, we display the headline value for the BSA property tracker, which measures the net balance of answers to the following question: “Is it a good time to buy property?”

The net balance is now at its lowest level since 2008. Residential property values tend to follow this series with a lag of 9 months, indicating a price decline may be ahead. 

Digging deeper into this topic, we looked at another question tracked by the BSA: “How do you expect residential property prices in the UK to move over the next 12 months?”

The result is displayed in the pie chart below: close to 50% of respondents expect a drop in prices. 

The BSA doesn’t just measure price expectations. Our final chart tracks perceptions of hurdles to ownership. Respondents were asked to select factors that would deter someone from buying a residential property.

We compared the most recent results with the second quarter of 2008 (the previous low point for the BSA tracker in the first chart). The top three answers for both time periods were similar: amassing a sufficient deposit, accessing mortgage credit, and the affordability of monthly repayments. Interestingly, respondents are not as concerned that prices will fall as they were in 2008. 

Chile

We’ve expanded our dataset covering the nation’s economic activity index. Users can now access sectoral breakdowns for this monthly leading indicator.

In the chart below, we display the first breakdown level for the index, which includes goods, services and wholesale & retail trade. The trade category rebounded the most after the 2020 lockdowns, but it’s also the sector suffering the most today, down about 10 percent year-on-year. More worryingly, the other two sectors are now little changed year-on-year.  

United States

We’ve added the Banking Conditions Survey, a dataset created by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas. The survey is conducted twice a quarter, and is based on a questionnaire sent to the banks and credit unions of the 11^th Federal Reserve District. More information about the methodology can be found here.

In the chart below, we displayed the net balance of responses to the following question: “Over the past six weeks, how have non-performing loans changed?” Respondents assessed conditions for various types of loans. 

The chart highlights that financial institutions reported an increase in all categories of non-performing loans as conditions tightened over the course of 2022. In the second pane, we track the outlook for non-performing loans, which measures financial institutions’ expectations over the next six months.