During a press lunch held earlier this week, the international consulting firm shared its market analysis with the media.
Between the Iran-US war, soaring oil prices, and the relentless surge of artificial intelligence, financial markets have navigated a high-tension Q1 of 2026.
For Grégoire Kounowski, investment strategy advisor at Norman K, the resilience shown by indices masks deep divergences between asset classes and global regions.
"The outbreak of the conflict led to a marked market correction, but the truce in early April, combined with Donald Trump's statements, fostered a rapid rebound in risk assets," the manager explained.
Long considered the ultimate safe haven, gold prices have nearly tripled since 2021. However, this momentum has stalled since the Iran conflict began. Consequently, during the first month of the war in March, gold lost nearly 18%, even hitting -20% mid-session. The yellow metal thus fell alongside equities.
"Gold is no longer a safe-haven asset; it has become a momentum asset," analyzes Grégoire Kounowski.
Even so, YTD, gold is still up 9%, although its price action now mirrors that of risk assets.
Defense retreats while AI flexes its muscles
Another paradox highlighted by Norman K is that defense stocks are retreating despite the opening of a new front. Furthermore, the healthcare sector, typically defensive, is also down. "It is, in fact, the only European sub-sector that has been negative since the start of the year," the specialist points out.
The only true winners of this period have been oil, AI, and semiconductors, which have soared within a few weeks.
While the rest of the world absorbed the shock, American tech continued its ascent. The Nasdaq-100 quickly erased its March correction, and stocks linked to artificial intelligence have posted spectacular performances since the beginning of the year: Intel at +217%, SK Hynix at +148%, Samsung at +114%, STMicroelectronics at +110%, and AMD at +104%.
"AI operates as a separate engine, unaffected by geopolitical crises," summarizes Grégoire Kounowski. This conviction largely explains the resilience of the US market compared to the rest of the world.
China-US: What if Iran was just a pretext?
For Grégoire Kounowski, the true fault line in the markets remains the Sino-American rivalry. "Since Trump's return, there has been a growing rivalry between China and the United States for global superpower status," the advisor notes.
And the Iranian conflict could well be a new disguised episode of this struggle. With Beijing being the primary buyer of Iranian oil, a hypothesis is circulating: "Could it be that, fundamentally, they attacked Iran to target China? It is possible," the manager muses.
In the meantime, the market's verdict is final: the MSCI China remains far from its peaks, weighed on by a persistent real estate crisis. Beijing's only ace in the hole is its strategic reserves, which are cushioning the shock better than elsewhere in Asia.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.