JF Asset Management, part of JP Morgan Fleming Asset Management, is reasonably upbeat about the immediate future of the world economy, with one or two reservations.
In particular, the group is bullish about the prospects of Asia ex- Japan, says Geoff Lewis, head of investment services.
'The region we like the most is Asia ex-Japan. That is because Asia will benefit from the perception of a recovery in the United States economy and it doesn't really need that - people have underestimated the extent to which Asia is now its own biggest market. It is the only region which has got China as an intra-regional growth driver,' Mr Lewis says.
'We are very positive on that. It is having a tremendous effect on a lot of companies in Korea. It is well known that Taiwan is more closely integrated than ever, but it is also having an impact on Japanese companies such as exporters of machine tools and precision equipment.'
He says prospects for the US economy are solid in the short term, although there is some doubt about whether US companies are going to be able to transform what has so far passed as a recovery into greater employment. This would make the recovery more sustainable.
'It is quite clear now that growth for the second half for the global economy is surprising on the upside,' he says.
'We have seen that very much in US data, we have seen it in the Japanese data. In Europe we have so far only seen it in the soft data - the business sentiment, but at least it has stopped deteriorating. So investors have built strong growth into expectations.
