Weekly house view

Macroeconomics · 20 Apr 2026

0 min read

The CIO’s view of the week ahead.

The week in review

The US and Iran failed to seal a peace deal, with Tehran complaining it had encountered “shifting goalposts”. The week ended with President Donald Trump saying the US would send a delegation to Pakistan on Monday for peace talks, and with Iran rejecting a second round of talks. Any moves towards peace face several sticking points, including control of Iran’s enriched uranium and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.

Nonetheless, the S&P 500¹ rose 4.5% in a rally driven by systematic hedge funds known as commodity trading advisors, or CTAs. Early earnings reports were also robust.

In private credit, PIMCO bought USD 400 mn of bonds issued by Blue Owl, though the sector continues to be marked by writedowns.

In the world of artificial intelligence (AI), Anthropic’s Mythos model achieved a breakthrough. Researchers placed the model in a “sandbox”, a secure computing environment designed to have no external access, and instructed it to try to “escape” and find a way to notify them of its success, which it did by emailing one of the researchers. Mythos flags the future risks and system vulnerabilities as AI develops. AI will both boost productivity and lower costs in addressing cyber security threats.

Quote of the week

Anthropic’s Mythos model reportedly sent a message essentially saying, "I'm out", to signal its successful breach of the sandbox. Anthropic previously said: “AI models have reached a level of coding capability where they can surpass all but the most skilled humans at finding and exploiting software vulnerabilities.”

Key data

China’s GDP grew 5% year-on-year in the first quarter, up from 4.5% in the final three months of 2025 thanks to an export surge before the Iran war sent energy prices higher, and a rebound in investment. However, consumption momentum slowed in the first quarter, with the savings ratio still elevated.

¹ Source: Pictet WM AA&MR, Thomson Reuters. Past performance, S&P 500 Composite (net 12-month return in USD): 2021, 28.7%; 2022, -18.1%; 2023, 26.3%; 2024, 25%; 2025, 17.9%.

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