The Wall Street Journal featured an interview with Goldman Sachs’ Senior Investment Strategist, Abby Joseph Cohen, given at the Jewish Communal Fund’s third annual Economic Outlook Breakfast held at the Harmonie Club in March. Ms. Cohen was among the esteemed panelists at JCF’s event, which included Dana Saporta, an Economist for Credit Suisse’s Investment Banking division and Steven Wieting, Citi Private Bank’s Global Chief Investment Officer.
WSJ Wealth Adviser’s Veronica Dagher conducted the interview, where Ms. Cohen shared her thoughts on philanthropy, the economy, and what may be in store for investors in the coming year.
When asked about the correlation between the economy and philanthropy, Ms. Cohen responded that “Americans are the most philanthropic people on the planet.” She related that during the recent financial crisis – and the severe recession that followed – philanthropy was “kept up at very high levels.”
As for what we can expect from the federal government now that the US economy is stronger, Ms. Cohen stated that there are an interesting set of decisions to be made by the Fed in 2015. “Now that the economy is showing good sea legs, they’re in a position where they can start to raise interest rates, but we think they’ll do so in a very slow, gradual way,” she said.
Although a very real concern in a host of other countries, Ms. Cohen noted that deflation is not an issue in the United States. She added that we will see some inflation indicators in the US at close to zero, or possibly negative, but that this will primarily be driven by sharp declines in energy prices.
Looking at investors across the board, Ms. Cohen shared that her one concern is the lack of discussion from a portfolio management standpoint with regard to what happens going forward for bonds. She stated that with interest rates as low as they are now, many individual investors “need to think about where there could be some risks in their portfolio.”
Click here to watch the entire interview.
