The following are economic outlooks from selected major banks for 2010. The factbox will be updated to include additional views, when they become available.
New entries marked *
* CREDIT SUISSE
"We approach 2010 with a degree of optimism that both the economic recovery and the stability in markets can be sustained, pointing to less volatile conditions in the year ahead, although the last 12 months have taught us to take little for granted.
"Our key macro themes can be summed up very succinctly. We think this will be (once again) a disinflationary recovery: 10-year G3+ real yields will end the year higher, breakevens lower and nominal yields little changed. We think the three stages of the 'exit strategy' (winding down QE, raising interest rates and fiscal consolidation) will help cap the upside for equities.
"The key for us to the fate of financials will ultimately be U.S. house prices -- the most important collateral within the (global) financial system -- and in our view extremely cheap."
BANK OF AMERICA MERRILL LYNCH
"This recovery will likely be weaker than what is typical coming out of a major recession. The speed of the recovery will dictate policy tightening, and with the economy operating under massive spare capacity, we expect core measures of inflation to continue to drop and most central banks to remain on hold through 1H 2010.
"We expect a muted recovery in developed economies to mean low core inflation and steep yield curves in 2010. In contrast, rising longer term rates make for a less attractive outlook for government and corporate bonds. We expect selective USD strength against some G10 currencies, but USD weakness against EM FX. Strong EM demand will help drive strength in commodities."
COMMERZBANK
"This year has seen the biggest peacetime contraction in world GDP since 1945 and a rebound of around 3 percent is expected in 2010. On the basis of IMF projections, Asia is likely to provide the biggest contribution to world growth next year, but the IMF also got it badly wrong 12 months ago when it assumed that Asia could decouple from the rest of the world. There is a risk that it will be similarly over-optimistic in 2010.
"The collapse in output has left the world economy with a huge amount of spare capacity which will result in higher global unemployment and lower inflation than prior to the crunch. One downside is that many of the imbalances in the global economy remain in place, with current account imbalances (i.e. savings imbalances) existing between the US and Asia. In addition, Asian exchange rates in particular seem to be heavily divergent from a measure based on fundamental fair value."
BNP PARIBAS
"Global growth will return in 2010 but it will be uneven. EMKs (emerging markets) will far outshine the advanced economies. Near term in the advanced economies, the bounce in activity will last a little longer than we previously thought, but headwinds will result in a soft patch next year in the G7.
"The main pressures on domestically generated inflation in the G7 are for a decline. EMKs generally have less spare capacity and face upside inflation risks much sooner than the West.
"Monetary policy needs vary widely. EMKs will need to tighten much sooner than the G7. We do not expect any rate hikes from the ECB, BoJ or Fed next year. We think many people are wrong to expect moves too early, given fragile growth and weak inflationary threats.
"Watch the liquidity management by central banks very closely as it will be a major driving force for markets next year."
MORGAN STANLEY
"The common theme for global economies and market performance in 2010 is that stimulus will be removed. In 2009, we said that economic recovery would be a response function to the implementation of fiscal and monetary stimulus and support facilities. Thus in 2010, economic recovery and market performance will be a response function to its withdrawal.
"This withdrawal will come in the form of tighter policy, the expiration of support facilities, increased cost of liquidity and regulation. The goal will be to shift the process of government-induced growth, which came as the result of transfer payments and deficits from the public sector, and shift it back to the private sector while increasing regulation.
"We expect this to be an uneven process globally and produce unsynchronized movements in rates and variable growth differentials; taking advantage of this will be a key source of revenues in 2010.
"The risks lie in the pace and degree at which this happens."
(To read Reuters economics blog, MacroScope, click on http://blogs.reuters.com/macroscope)