In this week’s edition, Macro D walks us through 3 new trades he has already entered — spanning EM and G10 FX crosses — along with 4 additional trades he is actively evaluating and has on his radar. That’s 7 trade ideas in total, each with a detailed macro rationale, from central bank policy divergences to inflation dynamics and the potential implications of the Middle East conflict on the broader macro landscape.

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Some of our readers have been asking for more granularity on Macro D’s positioning — entry levels, stop losses, take profits, and sizing. We heard you. In this piece, Macro D has provided his full trade spreadsheet, detailing every open position with exact entry, exit, stop loss, and size. Full transparency. That’s the standard we hold ourselves to here.

Whether you agree with every trade or not, the thought process behind each one is where the real value lies. This is macro trading in its purest form: thesis-driven, risk-defined, and executed with discipline.

Dive in below.

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A few months back, I hired a coach. Not a trading coach, not a productivity guru, not someone to tell me when to buy or sell. A coach with one singular goal: my road to self-mastery. You know, I hired one more than a decade ago, but then I thought I didn’t make enough progress to justify the outlay. The truth, however, was that I didn’t know what I was looking for. An easy mistake to make.

One of the very first things he asked me was deceptively simple. “What’s your why?” He wanted me to articulate why I am drawn to investing, to macro, to this whole pursuit of understanding markets and the world around them. There are millions of other things I could have chosen to do with my time, energy and focus. Why this?

I sat with that question for a while. It’s easy to blurt out the obvious answers. Money. Returns. Financial freedom. Sure, those matter. But if that’s all it was, I’d have burned out a long time ago. Or worse, I’d have become one of those hollow characters chasing a number that never feels like enough. I wrote about that very dynamic in my piece on money and career — the frustrating reality that no matter how much you earn, there’s always someone with multiples more. The hedonic treadmill is real, and it’s relentless, and you can only lose.

So the why can’t be primarily monetary. It has to mean something deeper. It has to connect to something that sustains you when markets are dull, when the news cycle is nothing but idiotic ping-pong, when geopolitics descends into pure noise that has little to do with macro or investing. You know the kind of days I’m talking about. We’ve had plenty of them lately amidst this absurd war. Days where you stare at your screens and wonder what any of this has to do with the craft you signed up for. Days, weeks and sometimes months when you're fighting a drawdown and when you literally can’t buy a damn basis point.

Those are precisely the days when the why matters most.

Everyone’s why is different. Some are drawn to the competition. The intellectual battle against millions of other participants, each trying to be right. Some live for the thrill — that rush when a thesis plays out, and you’re positioned correctly. Some, whether they’d admit it or not, are in it for the ego boost. The bragging rights. The scorecard.

I’ve been all of those at various points in my journey, if I’m being honest. But none of them lasted. None of them was enough to carry me through the inevitable drawdowns, the self-doubt, the periods where nothing seems to work, regardless of how sound your analysis is.

For me, the answer came back to something I’ve circled around in many of my writings here. Self-mastery. The markets are a mirror. An unforgiving, brutally honest mirror that reflects back every part of you — the discipline, the impatience, the greed, the fear, the ego, the humility. All of it. Every interaction with the market tells you something about yourself, if you’re willing to listen.

I keep saying that investing is a long, hard journey into yourself. There is a tremendous opportunity in that. The parts of me I haven’t yet figured out — the behavioural blind spots, the emotional triggers, the recurring patterns that hold me back — they all show up in how I interact with markets. The coach helped me see that this is not a bug but a feature. This is precisely why I’m drawn to it.

Of course, this goal never ends. You don’t wake up one morning having mastered yourself. That’s not how it works. But that’s precisely its purpose. The pursuit itself is the reward. Strive to get better every day. Compound not only your returns but also your knowledge and wisdom. And then share those with people who are on a similar path. That positive feedback loop is more powerful than any single trade.

That’s precisely what my journey has been and why I started this place. This blog was never meant to be a signal service or a tip sheet. It’s a reflection of my own pursuit, shared openly, in the hope that it resonates with those who feel drawn to the same kind of journey.

Speaking of the journey, pa-globalmacro.com has been the newest addition to the offering, available exclusively to paying subscribers. It’s where the model signals, dashboards, and analytical tools live. Things I have carved from my own personal pursuits in connecting with markets.

I have now added a new feature that I’m quite excited about. Subscribers can receive the daily signal and dashboard update directly into their email inboxes. No need to check the site every day. All you have to do is log in to your account, head to settings, toggle it on, and you’re set. Simple as that.

Are you ready to join and explore? Self-mastery is the goal, and my goal is to support all my members along their journey. The tools, the signals, the education — they’re all there to help you become a better, more informed version of yourself as an investor.

What are you waiting for?

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Next: Macro D Thoughts on upcoming central bank meetings, Weekly Macro Calendar, Dashboard / Charts / Asset Allocation Update

Let’s go!

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I used the relatively uneventful week to prepare and sharpen my tools for the next unfolding macro narrative.

Yes, I listened to Warsh’s testimony, which was equally boring.

It was a lot of political theatre and not nearly enough substance. But beneath the circus, there were a few genuinely consequential macro signals that the market is only beginning to digest.

The Regime Change

Warsh laid out three pillars that would fundamentally alter how the Fed operates. First, the abandonment of forward guidance and the dot plot. He was explicit: when the Fed telegraphs its forecasts, policymakers cling to them longer than they should, compounding errors. He is right. A world without dots is a world with structurally higher rates volatility. The entire edifice of front-end pricing has been built around a reaction function that Warsh wants to dismantle.

Second, the balance sheet. He wasn’t shy — the nearly $7 trillion of holdings is an echo of past crises and needs to come down more aggressively. MBS in particular. Wall Street has already coined this “QT for cuts”: shrink the balance sheet, create room to cut the front end. The maths might work on paper, but the transmission is messy.

Third, and this is the one that should raise eyebrows: his claim that cutting rates wouldn’t do much to inflation had me laughing. Let that sink in for a moment. The incoming Fed Chair is pre-emptively building the intellectual case for why rate cuts are harmless. If that isn’t laying the groundwork for delivering exactly what Trump wants, I don’t know what is. He can reject the “sock puppet” label all day long, but when you’re already constructing the narrative that easing won’t stoke prices, you’re essentially giving yourself permission to cut without accountability. It’s the first real hint that Warsh might indeed end up being Trump’s useful instrument, wrapped in the veneer of academic rigour. The market should take note.

Front-End Weakness and the Curve

Was it a coincidence that front-ends started weakening and curves flattened around the hearing? I’d argue no. SFRZ6 below, exhibiting weakness around his testimony onwards.

The front-end sell-off makes intuitive sense. Warsh pushed back convincingly against the idea that he’d simply deliver rate cuts on command. The market had been carrying some residual expectation of a reflexively dovish Warsh Fed. That got repriced. If the next Chair isn’t going to cut immediately — and his pushback on independence was just convincing enough — then the front end needs more uncertainty premium, not less.

The flattening tells you something more subtle. The long end didn’t sell off in sympathy because Warsh simultaneously signalled that the Fed’s footprint in the bond market is too large and that balance sheet reduction is coming. In the near term, the market hears “fewer cuts, or at least not on command” at the front, while at the back, it hears “we’ll eventually stop suppressing term premium.” That’s your flattener right there.

But as I’ve written before, narratives usually change after prices have already manifested a view. The medium-term direction, once Warsh is actually seated, should logically be curve steepening as term premium rebuilds and QT bites. The current flattening may well be setting up the steepening trade once the dust settles and the man is in the chair.

The week has been good (as of Thursday night) for my overall positioning. The 2026 portfolio has reached new highs, now up 11.35% YTD, comfortably outperforming the SPX and NDX (see chart below).

I am sharing a few more macro thoughts behind the paywall further below.

The newly established site on pa-globalmacro.com has seen increased interest. As a reminder, it is the new dedicated home for all my models and technical signals, currently housing the dashboard, signals, and the full chart book, spanning the entire global macro universe, from rates and FX to crypto and single-name stocks.

Paying subscribers have exclusive automatic access to all current features, and there is more in the pipeline.

A new feature, available immediately, allows you to subscribe to automatic email updates once the dashboard and signals have been published.

All you have to do is log in using your email (same as for Substack) and toggle on the email preferences. Job done, and you will get the dashboard and signals straight to your inbox daily.

Let’s now dig deeper into some of my macro observations, before we then also hear from Macro D on his latest thoughts on the ECB and markets.

I’m very proud of myself for having typed that far without having mentioned the war once. Amazing, but sadly, it seems far from over. I have some thoughts on it below as well.

Have a peaceful and joyous weekend.

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This piece attempts to synthesise what I’ve read, what I think is right, where I think the gaps are, and what it all means for positioning. I examine four distinct frameworks for thinking about AI’s impact on labour markets, financial stability, and asset prices — including a private credit mechanism that I believe is the most underappreciated systemic risk in the current market. The ideas are what matter, not who wrote them.

But I also wanted to go further than synthesis. One question kept nagging at me: does the physical world actually impose hard constraints on how quickly this disruption can happen, and what does the true economics of AI deployment look like once you strip away the venture-subsidised consumer pricing? Nobody I read had modelled this rigorously. So I built one. The results surprised me — the cost constraint has already collapsed, but the capacity constraint buys more time than the bears assume and considerably less than the bulls require. The critical window is 2027, and it is not far away.

The Iran conflict has added a dimension that sharpens several of the conclusions. The oil shock is compounding the consumer fragility the piece identifies; the Fed leadership transition is adding institutional uncertainty at the worst possible moment; and — perhaps most importantly — the energy costs of running the very infrastructure that enables AI displacement have risen structurally. The deflationary endgame runs through an inflationary phase first. That sequencing matters for every trade in the book.

Let’s dig in.

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It’s Sunday morning, and the euphoria of Friday seems to being dealt a blow as the Strait has been declared closed once again. I don’t know about you but this all is becoming a bit of a farce, which can be summarised in one simple picture.

Before we get into the usual macro business, I want to take a small detour into territory that doesn’t feature often enough in financial commentary. We often look at micro things rather than zooming out. Maybe we should zoom out much more sometimes.

I’ve long held the view that markets move in cycles. Not just the well-documented business cycles and credit cycles, but deeper, longer-duration patterns that repeat across decades and centuries. Any process that helps you identify where you are in a cycle has validity if it adds value to your decision-making. We don’t know what the future holds — nobody does — but I strongly believe that there are structural cycles in place that dominate financial markets, and that recognising them creates conditions that are either more or less favourable for your own investment framework.

One of the best traders I ever worked alongside used planetary cycles as a key input to her risk-taking. She was extremely successful and has since dedicated her life to astrology full-time. Enough said.

I bring this up because something genuinely unusual is happening in the sky this week, and given the macro backdrop we’re navigating, I think it’s worth laying out for those of you interested in cycles, timing, and the broader forces that shape market behaviour.

The Aries Stellium

Between April 15th and 20th, six celestial bodies converge in Aries: the Sun, Moon (new moon on the 17th), Mercury, Mars, Saturn, and Neptune. When this many planets cluster in a single zodiacal sign, astrologers call it a stellium — a rare concentration of energy. A six-body stellium is exceptionally uncommon. The last comparable clustering in Aries was April 2000, and that involved only four planets. Before that, you’d need to go back to the 1960s for anything similar in a cardinal fire sign.

The alignment peaks on the 19th and 20th, with a triple conjunction of Mercury, Mars, and Saturn. On top of that, Uranus moves into Gemini on April 25th, beginning a new seven-year transit — the kind of structural ingress that cycle analysts associate with lasting shifts in communication, technology, and trade.

Why Aries matters

Aries is the first sign of the zodiac — the initiator, the spark. It is ruled by Mars, the planet of action, conflict, and raw energy. In mundane astrology — the branch concerned with world events — Aries transits are associated with the outbreak or escalation of military conflict, assertive political leadership, and sharp, sudden directional pivots. When Mars transits its home sign, as it is now, the tradition associates it with heightened risk-taking, increased volatility, and a general sense that events are accelerating faster than the participants can fully process.

The sectors linked to Aries energy are precisely the ones dominating today’s tape: defence, energy, steel, and commodities. The overlap with the current macro environment is at least worth noting.

The Saturn-Neptune conjunction

This is the aspect generating the most discussion among cycle practitioners. Saturn represents structure, limitation, and constraint. Neptune represents oil, gases, liquids, and dissolution. One astrologer framed it with admirable economy: oil plus limitation equals energy crisis. The current Iran/Hormuz disruption maps onto this conjunction almost literally. And because Neptune remains in Aries until 2038, those who follow these cycles would argue that structurally cheap energy may be a thing of the past — that we’ve entered a new era where energy scarcity becomes a recurring theme rather than an occasional shock.

Historical parallels and the cycle evidence

This is where it gets genuinely interesting, regardless of where you sit on the philosophical spectrum. Prior Saturn-Neptune conjunctions and significant Aries stelliums have coincided with major geopolitical inflexion points with a consistency that deserves attention.

The previous Saturn-Neptune conjunction, in Capricorn in 1989, coincided with the fall of the Berlin Wall, the end of the Cold War, and the peak of the Japanese asset bubble. The one before that, in Libra around 1953, aligned with the Korean War armistice and a US recession. The Saturn-Uranus opposition of 2008 accompanied the global financial crisis.

The April 2000 Aries stellium — the closest historical analogue to this week — arrived right at the Nasdaq’s all-time high. The index had peaked on March 10th, and the stellium landed as the first leg of the tech crash was underway.

Going further back, concentrated Aries transits have coincided with the escalation phases of both World Wars. The 1939 Aries ingress of Mars preceded the outbreak of the European theatre. The concentrated Aries energy of spring 1914 preceded the cascade of events leading to the First World War. The pattern is consistent with the tradition’s interpretation: Aries clusters concentrate aggressive, impulsive energy, making conflict more likely and diplomatic resolution more fragile.

The cycle evidence, taken as a whole, suggests that periods of concentrated Aries energy tend to coincide with environments of heightened geopolitical risk, commodity volatility, and decisive — sometimes reckless — action by political leaders. Whether the planets cause this or simply mark the rhythm of deeper cycles that operate through human behaviour is a question I’ll leave to each of you. What matters to me as a practitioner is whether the pattern has predictive value. And the historical record is, at minimum, suggestive.

The current macro convergence

Here’s what makes this particular week so difficult to ignore, regardless of your framework. The celestial alignment is landing on top of a macro calendar that could hardly be more consequential. We are sitting at all-time highs on the S&P while fighting a war in the Middle East. Brent has eased from 100 USD. The Strait of Hormuz remains under Iranian control. The IMF has just cut global growth and raised its inflation forecast. A fragile ceasefire is holding by a thread. Kevin Warsh’s Senate confirmation hearing is on Tuesday. April PMIs drop later in the week. Tech earnings are starting. And core PCE is tracking toward 3.2% — the highest since late 2023.

The street’s latest macro thinking reinforces the tension. The front-contract oil price closed at its lowest since the conflict began, even as Trump ordered a Hormuz blockade — the oil curve is steepening, consistent with a short conflict but sustained higher commodity prices beyond it. The tech rally is real and fundamentally supported — China’s Q1 GDP beat, Asian exports are surging, and US IP growth is improving. But here’s the nuance most are missing: the tech investment cycle is currently inflationary, not disinflationary. US capital goods import prices are at pandemic-era highs. Copper has fully reversed its March losses. The broad commodity index is sitting near pandemic highs as pre-conflict tech-driven price increases have compounded with higher energy costs.

The de-escalation trade continues to work. Front-end European rates remain attractive, particularly in Sweden and the UK, where central banks have signalled patience. But the longer-term legacy of this conflict will be steeper curves and higher term premia — more inflation, more defence spending, more bond supply. Treasury curve steepeners remain compelling risk-reward. And the dollar debasement trade is bouncing back and deserves close attention heading into the Warsh hearings.

Cycles within cycles. Whether you read them in the stars, in the price action, or in the macro data, the message converges on the same point: we are at an inflexion, the energy is concentrated, and the next few weeks will set the direction for the rest of the year. Pay attention.

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I highly recommend reading Macro D’s final instalment in the All Gates, All Barbarians series. This time, he analyses Europe’s road ahead.

We then read his latest Macro thoughts and Global FX implications before looking at the latest charts and dashboard update, the weekly macro calendar and the output of the asset allocation model, which bought equities last week after staying put for a month. Will it keep its allocation or change?

Let’s find out.

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As flagged last week, momentum turned positive on equities — and the follow-through has been emphatic. This week’s update covers the full cross-asset scan: equities, rates, FX, commodities, and crypto. There are notable shifts forming beneath the surface that deserve your attention, particularly in rates and energy, where the signals are beginning to diverge from the headline narrative.

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For the new joiners, a quick reminder of how this works. The dashboard runs my proprietary momentum and reversal models, flagging where trend changes are forming, where momentum is accelerating, and where exhaustion signals are building. These are the same models available to paid subscribers as TradingView scripts. The charts don’t care about headlines, geopolitics, or what anyone said on financial television. They read price, structure, and momentum — nothing more, nothing less. When they turn, you pay attention.

What is the Dashboard?

The PA - Global Macro Chart Dashboard is a daily technical analysis summary covering ~200 securities across 9 asset classes: global equity indices, US sectors, US & international stocks, ETFs, fixed income, FX, commodities, and crypto. It is generated after market close and provides an at-a-glance view of trend direction, momentum, reversal signals, and sequential counts for every instrument.

Each row shows you the trend direction (Momentum), how strong it is (Strength, scored 0–10), whether a potential turning point is forming (Reversal), and where the market sits in its exhaustion cycle (TD). Signal Date and performance track when the current signal fired and how it’s performing since. For the S&P 500, for example, the momentum long was initiated on April 9th and has since generated a 4.4% return.

In addition, you will find individual charts for all securities, each including the momentum and reversal model indicators.

As a new feature, I have added a daily run of changes that flags any securities experiencing changes in any of their models.

The best thing is, this is just the start. I plan to add more tools going forward to help you all navigate the road ahead.

Let’s now check out the full dashboard and accompanying individual charts.

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The SPX hit a fresh all-time high on Wednesday, closing above 7,000 for the first time. After falling nearly 10% from its January peak into late March — deep enough to qualify as a textbook correction — the index has roared back more than 10% in two weeks. The Nasdaq has gone from oversold to overbought in just 11 trading sessions, the fastest such swing in data going back to the early 1980s. Whether this is the beginning of a durable new leg higher or the market front-running a peace deal that doesn’t yet exist is the question that matters.

The current move sits firmly in the extreme right tail. Of the 13 prior instances, the majority occurred at major secular turning points — bottoms of bear markets or the end of geopolitical crises. The question, as always, is whether this is 2009 (launch of a durable new uptrend) or late 1932 (violent counter-rally within a longer bear market).

What’s driving it? Hope with a sprinkle of forced buying and short covering. The ceasefire headlines out of the Middle East, however fragile, unleashed the most aggressive short-covering in a decade. Hedge funds flipped from eight straight weeks of net selling to net buying. Systematic trend followers ploughed billions back into equities. The mechanical bid was enormous, and it fed on itself. But strip away the positioning unwind and what you’re left with is a market trading at all-time highs on the assumption that a war is over when, in reality, we don’t even have a framework for peace. The Islamabad talks produced handshakes but no deal. Iran still controls the Strait of Hormuz. Brent is sitting around $97 after swinging violently in both directions this week. Trump says the war is ‘very close to over.’ Iran says it won. Neither statement inspires much confidence in a lasting resolution.

Meanwhile, the IMF dropped its Spring World Economic Outlook this week, and the title alone tells you everything: ‘Global Economy in the Shadow of War.’ Global growth has been cut to 3.1% for 2026, with downside risks dominating. Headline inflation forecasts have been revised up. Under their adverse scenario — a longer conflict and sustained high energy prices — growth falls to 2.5%, and inflation hits 5.4%. Under the severe scenario, we’re looking at 2% growth and inflation above 6%. Those aren’t fringe outcomes. They’re plausible tail risks sitting right there in the IMF’s own scenario analysis.

The IMF’s Article IV consultation with the US was equally pointed. The Executive Board was blunt: there is little room to cut interest rates in 2026. Monetary policy easing would be appropriate only if the labour market deteriorates materially and inflationary pressures decline. In other words, the bar for cuts is high and getting higher. Core PCE sat at 2.9% in 2025 and has barely budged. Energy prices remain the wildcard. The Fed funds rate is projected to go from 3.6% to 3.4% this year — that’s barely one cut’s worth of easing for the entire calendar year. The message is clear: patience, not panic. The IMF’s Georgieva put it well when she advised central banks with strong credibility to ‘look before you leap’ rather than react aggressively to what might still prove to be a transitory supply shock.

This is where it all connects. We have an equity market pricing in the best-case scenario — war over, oil back down, Fed cutting — while the macro institutions are telling you the risks are skewed firmly to the downside. The IMF is calling for patience on rates. Oil remains structurally elevated. The ceasefire is armed, not assured. And yet here we are, at all-time highs.

I’m not saying the market is wrong. Markets have a remarkable ability to discount turning points before they arrive — after all, the stock market bottomed in May 1942, months before troops were deployed in major theatres. There’s historical precedent for this. But there’s also historical precedent for markets front-running a resolution that never comes, and the subsequent repricing is not gentle.

The earnings backdrop does offer genuine support. Consensus expects 12% year-on-year EPS growth for the S&P this quarter, with Tech delivering 45% growth and accounting for nearly 90% of the index’s total earnings expansion. AI investment spending is estimated to drive about 40% of full-year S&P earnings growth. The micro keeps getting stronger even as the macro remains deeply unresolved. That tension is the story of this market right now.

Our momentum dashboard confirmed the turn last week. In addition, our asset allocation model flipped to long bonds this week, another timely signal forming our more bullish stance for now. There is, however, little time to rest on our laurels as we are firmly focused on the path ahead. The dashboard has already shown some reads that are giving us clues about what’s going to transform next. Behind the paywall, I present a framework I apply to the SPX to map out scenarios for the journey ahead.

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For all new subscribers or those considering joining the pack, the dedicated technical macro offering on pa-globalmacro.com is now available as either an add-on to your current subscription or as a standalone plan directly on the site. Everything you know and love stays right here — the regular publications, thought pieces, and educational content aren’t going anywhere.

Also, a reminder that you can use my trading models in TradingView scripts, which I made available for subscribers to use on their charts. This is not free and also incurs an additional cost. These are the momentum, reversal, and intra-day models I often reference. If you are interested, ping me an email with your TV username. Note that only paying subscribers will be granted access. No exceptions.

Let’s now picture the likely roadmap for the SPX as it presents itself before we hear Macro D’s latest thoughts for the week.

Have a great weekend.

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In this fifth instalment of All Gates, All Barbarians, the focus shifts from power to price, from geopolitics to currency, and from ideology to timing. This is a macro environment where nothing is clean anymore: not the euro, not central banking, not even conviction itself. Every opportunity carries claws. Every danger carries a seduction.

Europe stands at the centre of this contradiction. Public debt issuance is accelerating, inflation is cooling, and yet Frankfurt is flirting with a stronger euro — not as an economic necessity, but as a political ambition. Behind the language of stability and prestige lies something more fragile: career incentives, institutional pride, and a growing distance between what protects the currency and what protects its citizens.

This is not a piece about forecasts or fair value. It is about behaviour. About how central banks act when prestige competes with pragmatism, when politics leaks into monetary policy, and when flexibility matters more than orthodoxy. It is about recognising that in this regime, price levels matter less than the philosophy that produces them.

Behind the paywall, we examine Lagarde’s turn, the ECB’s internal fault lines, the euro’s false friends, and why this year will not be about “being long or short,” but about when, how, and for how long.

In a world where all roads are open, only humility keeps you alive.

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Markets have an extraordinary ability to reprice hope at warp speed. The ceasefire headlines, however fragile and however far from any real peace deal, were enough to trigger an aggressive short-covering rally for the record books. Hedge funds net bought global equities for the first time in eight weeks. US-listed ETF shorts declined by over 11% in a single week — the largest weekly percentage covering in ten years. CTAs hoovered up an estimated $19 billion in US equities, the biggest single-week surge in systematic buying since August 2024. This wasn’t conviction buying. This was a positioning squeeze dressed up as a rally.

Beneath the index-level rebound, the tape was far from indiscriminate. There was clear demand for leadership and aggressive shorting of laggards, nowhere more visible than inside the AI complex, where the gap between winners and losers hit an all-time high. Software net exposure has collapsed to just 1.4% of total US net, a full round trip back to the record lows we saw in late February. Meanwhile, consensus still expects 12% year-on-year S&P earnings growth this quarter, with Info Tech alone accounting for nearly 90% of the index's total EPS growth. The micro keeps getting stronger even as the macro remains deeply unresolved.

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And that’s the puzzling situation for many investors. While the market has declared the war as over, I wouldn’t be so quick to close that book. The Islamabad talks produced nothing concrete. Iran still controls the Strait. The ceasefire is armed, fragile, and could unravel at the drop of a hat. Since the conflict began, headline PCE forecasts have been revised up by a full percentage point, GDP growth has been cut, and unemployment expectations are creeping higher. The stagflationary undertow hasn’t gone away just because the VIX has come in.

Here’s what I keep coming back to. Our dashboard flagged last week that momentum in equities had turned. Not hope, not narrative, not vibes — the model turned. And this is the point I want to stress, especially for those who found the past few weeks disorienting. It’s easy to get anchored by headlines, by the emotional whiplash of annihilation rhetoric one day and rally mode the next. The models don’t care about any of that. They read price, flow, and structure. When they turn, you pay attention. When they don’t, you stay disciplined. That’s the entire point of having a process.

A reminder that the dashboard, the underlying individual charts and the signals are all now located on our newly dedicated site under pa-globalmacro.com.

Paid subscribers can access all current tools using their emails. I am working on additional tools and delivering content directly to subscribers, so bear with me.

The 2026 buy-and-hold portfolio is now at a new high, having comfortably outperformed US equity indices through the recent volatility. The hedges embedded in the portfolio performed their role during the drawdown and remain in place. While the market may have moved on, the risks haven’t. A renewed flare-up in the Gulf, a breakdown in the ceasefire, a Hormuz headline at 3 am — any of these could reprice risk as violently as the rally just repriced hope.

For paid subscribers, I’ve broken down the positioning data in detail below, the key flow signals, what the model is telling us across asset classes, and how I’m thinking about the portfolio from here.

Let’s go!

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Two papers crossed my desk last week that, taken together, paint a remarkably complete picture of how the Fed thinks about inflation and what that means for markets when oil gets volatile — which, given the Iran conflict and the current near-shutdown of Hormuz, couldn’t be more relevant.

The first one I introduced in last Friday’s thought piece, analyses nearly nine decades of FOMC meeting records to uncover how the committee has diagnosed inflation in real time — and how differently it has responded depending on whether it saw demand or supply forces at the root. The findings reshape how you should think about the Fed’s reaction function, particularly right now as we stare down two inflationary supply shocks at once: tariffs and an oil price spike driven by geopolitical conflict. Whether the Fed maintains its historical discipline or panics and fights the wrong type of inflation is, in my view, the single most important macro question of this cycle and will determine macro markets over the coming months. Read about it in the post below.

The second paper, which I am analysing further below in this post, tackles the other side of the coin — what oil price volatility actually does to firm-level price setting and whether it blunts monetary policy’s effectiveness. With Brent swinging violently on every Hormuz headline, this isn’t just an academic exercise.

I’ve written up both with the charts that matter and my take on what the research means for today’s policy stance, the rate curve, and how you should be thinking about positioning. Paid subscribers, it’s all yours below.

We then follow the usual script: look at the weekly global macro calendar, analyse the dashboard signals, and see what the asset allocation model has decided to do in this week’s rebalancing.

As always, Macro D is giving us his latest take on the markets while updating us on his Macro FX trades. The latest piece from him (see below) takes the philosophical frame and turns it into trade logic: how he thinks the market will keep swinging between horizons, and how he expresses that view through energy and macro pricing.

As a reminder, the new technical site at pa-globalmacro.com is live and delivering daily dashboard, chart and signal insights.

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But now let’s first tackle that paper I mentioned above. Have a wonderful week ahead.

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Is this it? I don’t think so. I didn’t lift a finger or change anything in my trades. Markets moved into a new equilibrium, seemingly removing nasty tail-risk scenarios, while we are still far from finding an agreeable endstate for all involved parties.

There is still economic and vast infrastructure damage, with its waves still finding their way into macroeconomic variables. There is virtually zero chance that markets have priced this perfectly, so volatility will remain high for the coming weeks.

A good video (35 minutes) to watch in this regard is the interview with Niall Ferguson, which sharpened something that feels underpriced right now. His point was simple: Iran may think it’s winning — and that belief matters. Not because it is winning in a conventional military sense, but because it hasn’t lost. It can still impose costs, still disrupt flows, still deny the U.S. and Israel a clean, decisive outcome. In geopolitics, that’s often enough to claim victory.

That creates a dangerous mismatch. The West — and markets by extension — are leaning toward resolution, toward a narrative that this is stabilising, contained, heading toward closure. Iran, on the other hand, is operating as if the game is still very much on. And if one side thinks the war is ending while the other thinks it’s in a shifting phase, you don’t get equilibrium — you get a second move.

What matters here isn’t the headline ceasefire, but the persistence of leverage. Iran doesn’t need to dominate the battlefield; it needs to retain the ability to disrupt the system — oil, shipping, regional stability. As long as that remains intact, the conflict hasn’t been resolved; it has simply changed form. That’s the piece the market is going to struggle with.

The result is a familiar setup: perceived closure versus actual continuation. Markets price the end of the story, while the actors inside it are still writing the next chapter. And when that gap closes, it rarely does so quietly.

As for my strategy, the buy-and-hold portfolio has hit a new high as of Wednesday's close, now standing at +10.33%, comfortably outperforming both the SPX and NDX. The allocations, coupled with the hedges, are still working. As for my general trading, there is no rush, as I believe patience will be rewarded. Equities and bonds will likely be in a range, and I want to avoid being drawn into the noise and rather observe and plan when to engage. There will be plenty of opportunities ahead.

The newly launched dedicated site for all my technical models has been well-received so far. The dashboard, individual charts, and signals are updated daily. I am working on additional tools, but will only launch once I’m happy with their quality, so stay tuned.

For all new subscribers or those considering joining the pack, the dedicated technical macro offering on pa-globalmacro.com is now available as either an add-on to your current subscription or as a standalone plan directly on the site. Everything you know and love stays right here — the regular publications, thought pieces, and educational content aren’t going anywhere.

Also, a reminder that you can use my trading models in TradingView scripts, which I made available for subscribers to use on their charts. This is not free and also incurs an additional cost. These are the momentum, reversal, and intra-day models I often reference. If you are interested, ping me an email with your TV username. Note that only paying subscribers will be granted access. No exceptions.

Let’s now revisit something that’s been on my mind and won’t change, regardless of whether we see a resolution, as the damage of a supply shock is still very real. How should central banks treat this shock? In particular, how has the Fed previously reacted, and what can we reasonably expect this time around? We know the ECB is trigger-happy given its sole inflation mandate.

I am revisiting a fascinating paper (no pun intended) that asks a deceptively simple question: Does the Fed treat all inflation the same? Spoiler — it doesn't. The results, however, have serious implications for how we should think about the current policy mix and what it means for rates and risk assets.

Our friend Macro D also has some thoughts to share from his perch. His running book of Macro FX trades has continued to perform well as he updates us on his latest calls.

Let’s explore.

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It’s the oscillation.

One day, the world is told that an agreement is imminent; the next, it’s threats, ultimatums, and theatre. The market reacts the same way: it prices the off-ramp, then it reprices the trapdoor, then it convinces itself again that this is all temporary. Short term, long term. Hope, then recoil. Repeat.

This piece sits exactly in that tension. Macro D frames the Strait of Hormuz not as a headline, but as a hinge—because oil is not a moral variable. It’s a transmission mechanism. When energy rises, and volatility rises with it, inflation risk hardens, central banks lose flexibility, and what looked like a clean “rate cut” story starts to look like a narrative in search of data.

He also pulls the Fed succession thread into the same tapestry: a market that wants easing, a political cycle that demands it, and a macro backdrop that may not allow it. If you want the reasoning that links the rhetoric, the oil tape, and the rate path—this is it.

Behind the paywall, Macro D takes the philosophical frame and turns it into trade logic: how he thinks the market will keep swinging between horizons, and how he expresses that view through energy and macro pricing.

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Trump’s deadline is coming up, and the rhetoric has decisively shifted to a more aggressive tone just as Trump is threatening to take down a whole civilisation.

Strong words admittedly, yet markets have traded in relative calm, anticipating another extension or a last-minute taco manoeuvre. As I am typing this, markets are reacting to news that Pakistan is aiming to mediate a 2-week extension. What do we call this? Third-party Taco? Markets seem willing to look past the immediate threats. Yes, there will be long-standing implications, but these can be discounted relatively swiftly as macro finds a new equilibrium.

I have no idea what is going to happen, of course. I would find it odd to move that much military presence into the region without any sign of engagement. This has never happened before, I have been told.

Rather than second-guessing, I am preparing myself for whatever the outcome may be. Part of my preparation is reviewing charts and the newly established dashboard, which neatly summarises the key findings indicated by my models.

My asset allocation has worked well, and my hedges have performed precisely as intended. But that’s in the past, and while I am very pleased, I am focusing on the next setup and related opportunities.

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As a reminder, I launched the newly dedicated site to my models & charts. All paying subscribers have been granted access. Thank you for the kind comments, and I hope the new addition is helpful.

The dashboard, charts and signal alerts have been updated as of today, and you will find all details on the new site.

Below, I am attaching the latest dashboard for convenience and a quick update on the latest PAAM weekly asset allocation model.

Have a great week ahead!

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First of all, a quick announcement. I am thrilled to introduce a new dedicated site, the home of all my models, dashboards, and signals. pa-globalmacro.com.

It is also the launchpad for any new strategy and further technical enhancement I am building out, and I am excited about what’s to come.

The best part: all current and future developments will be free for existing paying subscribers.

If you're thinking about subscribing, now is the time. I will be grandfathering all members up until Monday, 6th April, onto the new site at no extra cost. After that, pricing will change for new subscribers.

Subscribe now

If you're already a member, you don't need to do anything — I have already added you as a member to the new site. Go ahead, you should have full access already. Just click on sign in, use the same email you subscribed to this publication and you should receive a magiclink with a code and be good to go.

And yes, of course, this site will remain the home of my thoughts and regular publications.

What's on the site today

For now, the site includes the recently launched dashboard, which shows all currently tracked securities and gives an overview of momentum strength, reversal plays and performance since the momentum signal has fired.

In addition, you will find individual charts for all securities, each including the momentum and reversal model indicators.

As a new feature, I have added a daily run of changes that flags any securities experiencing changes in any of their models.

The best thing is, this is just the start. I plan to add more tools going forward to help you all navigate the road ahead.

Let’s now turn to markets. First, a heads-up to Macro D’s new Macro FX Trade Corner piece, where he is presenting 6 new FX trade ideas to our pack.

Our buy-and-hold portfolio for the year ended March on a strong footing, having almost regained the high watermark of just north of 10%, and now tracking YTD USD performance of 9.2%. The hedges have worked while we are letting the strategic allocations run.

Markets don’t move in straight lines. Thursday saw another risk-off event after Trump failed to convince market participants with his much-anticipated speech. While there was nothing new in his rhetoric, the lack of detail or plan left many unimpressed. I wasn’t surprised and saw the strong rally into quarter-end and the first day of Q2 as a fading opportunity. If there is no coherent strategy, fat tails are growing bigger by the day. Anything can happen at this stage, although my sense is that we will likely see further escalation. Is there reason to panic? Only those who don’t know what they are doing.

Behind the paywall, I am posting an important link to an interview with a seasoned central banker and someone who, to me, symbolises the current framework of monetary policy across the major global central banks. His words carry weight, and I was somewhat surprised to hear his thoughts on the current crisis.

We will also hear Macro D’s latest thoughts and Macro FX implications before we have a look at the latest edition of the Global Macro Dashboard.

Have a wonderful Easter weekend. I will be travelling, and given the long weekend, normal business will resume next week. There will be no ATW update this weekend. Instead, I will post the latest Asset Allocation Update to subscribers next week. Of course, if any new developments change my views, I will communicate my thoughts here or over Substack chat.

Let’s now dig in.

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This Trade Corner is the first pass at positioning for April. There are six new trades on deck this time around, each built around the same framework: clear levels, clear invalidation, and a reason the setup exists now, not “someday.”

Let’s go.

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What is the Dashboard?

The PA - Global Macro Chart Dashboard is a daily technical analysis summary covering ~200 securities across 9 asset classes: global equity indices, US sectors, US & international stocks, ETFs, fixed income, FX, commodities, and crypto. It is generated after market close and provides an at-a-glance view of trend direction, momentum, reversal signals, and sequential counts for every instrument.

Each row shows you the trend direction (Momentum), how strong it is (Strength, scored 0–10), whether a potential turning point is forming (Reversal), and where the market sits in its exhaustion cycle (TD). Signal Date and performance track when the current signal fired and how it’s performing since. For the S&P 500, for example, the momentum short was initiated on February 13th and has since generated a 6.8% return.

Let’s now check out the full dashboard. I hope subscribers have found it useful in navigating the recent weeks.

Let’s go straight to it.

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USD/JPY has a way of dragging me back to first principles.

Every time it leans into 160, it stops being “just another level” and starts behaving like a referendum — on credibility, on patience, on who really holds the steering wheel in Japan.

Is this Ueda’s market, where the Bank of Japan slowly reclaims control after a generation of repression? Or is it Takaichi’s Japan now, where fiscal impulse and political mandate quietly box the central bank into a narrower corridor?

In the pages that follow, Macro D is going to walk through the stretch from Takaichi’s election victory to the latest BoJ meeting, and ask a simple question with an uncomfortable answer: when the world is changing fast, who is actually allowed to move — and who is only allowed to react?

Let’s dig in.

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Stories don’t unfold in straight lines. They unfold in acts.

A first act in which the premise is established, and everyone thinks they understand the plot. A second act in which the story complicates itself, characters reveal their true motives, and the audience begins bargaining with reality. And then the third act—where consequences arrive, usually late, usually heavier than expected.

We like to pretend geopolitics is different. That it’s a headline, a spike, a fade.

But the current situation isn’t dissimilar to theatre. A war has been raging for a month now, while we were told—or perhaps we told ourselves—that it would be over soon.

Maybe we weren’t lied to. Maybe we were just hoping.

Financial markets, in their messy, complex-adaptive way, move from one act to the next, just as a crowd changes its mood. Not dogmatically. Not cleanly. Always probabilistically. One piece of information doesn’t “decide” anything. It nudges the distribution.

We hoped for TACO. We had signs, little flashes of “productive conversations,” the kind of headlines that feel like the curtain is about to fall, and we can all go home. And then they didn’t turn out to be true—or at least not true enough to matter, not for now.

That’s the part nobody enjoys: when the hope rally is built on a story that can’t carry weight.

I took a long walk through London over the weekend. More than ten kilometres, stopping at a few of my favourite pubs along the way. People were socialising and drinking as if it were any other weekend. Talking to friends revealed nothing unusual either. No sense that the world was ending. No collective trembling.

So I asked myself: Is it us?

Is it the financial world—entrenched in hourly candles and daily gyrations—that begins to feel apocalyptic in what is, for most people, just another month on the calendar?

If you read the right tweets, you’d swear civilisation was in its final chapter. But systems don’t turn on a tweet. They turn on time, on realisation, on pain.

And last week, we saw more pain creep into places that had been resilient for far too long. The S&P 500 is down roughly 7% year-to-date and around 4% over the last six months. That’s not a catastrophe, but it’s nothing either. Wealth effects don’t announce themselves with sirens. They bite quietly. Confidence frays at the edges first, then spending, then hiring, then margins.

Friday’s market reaction felt like another small shift in the play. Front-end yields rallied while gold lifted at the same time. That combination always makes me pause. It whispers that the market is starting to look past the inflation spike and the repricing of rate cuts/hikes—and toward the next act.

A world where growth and margin assumptions get repriced under the weight of supply constraints and their inflationary aftertaste, and where demand starts to bend.

That’s the phase that deserves respect.

Because this is when correlations can flip. This is when what “always works” starts to fail. This is when markets stop pricing a single path and start pricing a wider tail.

And in that environment, being clever is less useful than being prepared.

That’s the work of PA–Global Macro. Not predicting the plot, but tracking the scene changes. Not trying to be roughly right with a big narrative, but refusing to be precisely wrong with a fragile one.

Our buy-and-hold 2026 portfolio (white line below) is up 8.8% YTD and comfortably outperforming the SPX (blue) and Nasdaq (red).

The new dashboard—covering the major global macro markets—is being built to do exactly that: give us a clearer read on where the road is headed and when the system's tone is changing.

On the S&P 500 specifically, the model shifted to a short on February 13. Since the signal fired, that’s been close to a 7% move in our favour. Not because we “knew” anything, but because the process was ready when the act changed.

Existing subscribers will soon see their subscription value augmented again, as I roll out dedicated models and strategy frameworks I’m building around these regime shifts.

If you’ve been thinking about subscribing, now is the best time to join the pack. I’ll be grandfathering all current subscribers into the expanded offering. Pricing and access will change going forward, because the product is changing too. More tools and more time spent creating valuable inputs for the community.

Subscribe now

Let’s now explore what we always do for our members. Analyse the weekly calendar and scan for a few interesting chart setups. We then get our friend Macro D (a fine Macro FX brain) and his thoughts before we close with the output of our long-standing asset allocation model, which has turned off allocations to both bonds and equities over the past few weeks as it scans for re-entries. Will it be changing anything this week?

We shall see. Rest assured, we are ready for the next act.

That’s the thing about acts.

They don’t wait for us to be comfortable.

They just change the lighting—and reveal what was always there.

Let’s explore.

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Thank you for all your feedback. There is more to come, as I am working to expand the offering by introducing additional features and tools. I’m excited about what is to come. All current paid subscribers will receive every new feature and tool we build at no additional cost — your rate is locked in permanently. However, our pricing structure will be changing as new features are introduced, so if you've been thinking about subscribing, now is the time to lock in the current rate before this offer closes.

Subscribe now

What is the Dashboard?

The PA - Global Macro Chart Dashboard is a daily technical analysis summary covering ~200 securities across 9 asset classes: global equity indices, US sectors, US & international stocks, ETFs, fixed income, FX, commodities, and crypto. It is generated after market close and provides an at-a-glance view of trend direction, momentum, reversal signals, and sequential counts for every instrument.

Each row shows you the trend direction (Momentum), how strong it is (Strength, scored 0–10), whether a potential turning point is forming (Reversal), and where the market sits in its exhaustion cycle (TD). Signal Date and performance track when the current signal fired and how it's performing since. For the S&P 500, for example, the momentum short was initiated on February 13th and has since generated a 6.8% return.

Let’s now check out the full dashboard and accompanying individual charts.

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While I’m typing this, Trump has released a statement, nicely, a few minutes after market close, declaring a further extension of his self-imposed deadline, initially set at 48 hours, to Easter Monday, 6th of April. Talks are ongoing, and obviously, things are going really well.

ES futures initially jumped, then retraced more than half of that gain. Welcome to Trump’s world. Bonds, which have sold off all day, hardly flinched. Is he losing his Taco spice? He needs to find another magical way to calm markets. The market is also slowly coming to the realisation that a further delay will harm global markets even more, as supply disruptions in Asia are already underway. Things have to end soon.

It’s been a steady week for our 2026 buy-and-hold portfolio. The hedges are working, and we are participating in upside when it materialises. Would I lift the hedges if I could? Absolutely not. They are the proverbial brakes we have in place to keep pushing the pedal. We’re up 9% YTD and only around 1% below our high-water mark from February.

The models have again helped us navigate these treacherous waters, warning us about a reversal in US rates and gold/silver earlier this week. Reversals, however, are mini-cycles within a broader trend. Those trends are being monitored through my momentum model. All signals from both models are now part of the dashboard (see below), which I am working to automate. There is much more in the pipeline, but it takes time to build. Rest assured, all current subscribers will have access to it at no additional cost. And yes, it’s a good time to join now.

Let’s now circle back to a few charts, as well as my current thinking on how central banks should react to the oil supply shock. Front-ends have reacted viciously. Is it a regime change or a massive opportunity?

Macro D is also giving us his latest thoughts on the current situation and what it implies for his running book of Macro FX trades.

The charts and dashboard will follow over the weekend with Friday’s closing prices.

Let’s explore.

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