Four key strategies for borrowing during interest-rate uncertainty

By Greg Martinez-Miller

While basketball fans everywhere are following NBA schedules, business owners are tracking the 2024 Fed meeting schedule. But just as true hoops enthusiasts know that game strategy is comprised of more than three-point shots, so should business owners remember that interest rates aren’t the only factor for long-term success. Last December, the Fed said that it expected to cut rates, which are at a 22-year high, three times in 2024. Yet when the central bank met in March, it left rates unchanged, saying it didn’t want to jeopardize lower inflation and healthy economic growth.

So, when the Federal Open Market Committee meets again on April 30-May 1, anticipation will be high. Prognosticators are on every channel, wondering whether the central bank will keep its 5.25-5.5% target rate unchanged again, or if it will announce the first of its three cuts. And if it does, observers ask, how could lower rates impact growth in the U.S. economy? 

As a commercial banker who has watched the interest rate scoreboard over the past 16 years, here’s my advice from the sidelines: Stick to your long-term game plan. Put your company in a position to win the balance-sheet game when it comes to the cost of capital.

Here are my four key strategies from my dogeared playbook to keep your head in the game:

1. See the court

Do not focus on interest rates alone for your capital strategy. You need to be aware of other negotiated factors when funding your company’s financial future. Besides interest rates, other terms — loan maturity, advance rates, and guarantees — can offer important value. Many times, it makes good strategic sense to pivot from the interest rate toward other terms to advance your company’s medium- and long-term game plan.

2. Do not overreact to the officials

The Fed is like an economic referee, making calls to control the economy’s pace. Do not lose your cool when the whistle blows. Three rate reductions are still expected this year, but when the central bank plans to make that call, no one knows – yet.

3. Manage the clock

Think about timing when it comes to borrowing. When rates dip, you might consider making a few key borrowing moves to fund some crucial projects and wait to fund other projects later in the game. Consider the purpose of the debt on your balance sheet. Would your company benefit from having a mix of floating and fixed rates? This may allow you to hedge and still potentially benefit from low floating rates, while also maintaining certainty for longer-term, fixed rates.

4. Stick with your game plan

When rates do change, do not throw out your playbook. Instead, call a time out and consult with your banker or interest rate risk advisor to help ensure your borrowing decisions match your company’s long-term plans and goals for continued growth and success.

If you do not need capital, do not borrow just to lock in a lower rate. Interest rates should not be the driving factor when making borrowing decisions. Borrow when you need to; have a good reason for it.

Remember, interest rate changes will always interrupt the flow of your game. But your goal is to ensure that your financial future is deliberate – not purely defensive, based on the ebb and flow of interest rates.

Greg Martinez-Miller is the commercial banking leader for Wells Fargo in Inland Empire. Based in Ontario, Martinez-Miller leads a team of commercial relationship managers in Riverside and San Bernardino Counties. The views expressed present the opinions of the author on prospective trends and related matters in middle market banking trends as of this date, and do not necessarily reflect the views of Wells Fargo & Co., its affiliates and subsidiaries.

Leading Economic Forecast Pushes Back Against “Doom and Gloom” Prophecies; State’s Housing Supply Problem At The Crux Of Slowing Economy

California is far from becoming the ‘failed state’ depicted by critics, and even a cursory look at the data proves it, says one of the state’s leading economic forecasts. According to Beacon Economics‘ latest outlook for California, the state’s economy will continue to grow in the near future and there is little sign of a recession in 2024.

Consider a few of the new forecast’s findings:

• Since just prior to the pandemic, the number of jobs in California has grown by only 2.1%, compared to 3.7% in the nation as a whole, however, the state’s private sector output has grown by 10% compared to just 8% in the nation overall. This means that California’s output has expanded through greater worker productivity.

• California’s median household income grew by 9.2% from 2019 to 2022, compared to just 8% growth in the nation overall. Median incomes in the state are now 14.3% higher than in the U.S. as a whole, the largest gap ever seen in this data.

• Real income (accounts for inflation) has increased despite persistent claims to the contrary. Official data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics shows a 20% increase in consumer prices in California between the end of 2019 and the end of 2023, but a 23% increase in workers’ average weekly earnings over the same period. Importantly, the earnings growth has been greatest among lower skilled workers, according to the new forecast.

• From 2019 to 2022, the average poverty rate in California was 12%, lower than the U.S. average and the lowest level ever seen in the state.

The new forecast is careful to acknowledge California’s glaring problems, including its housing shortage and massive budget deficit, but argues that untruthful and excessively negative narratives are making things materially worse by affecting the way leaders spend their time and do their jobs.

“The state’s economy certainly has its share of problems, but many of these issues are things that can be solved with some pragmatic changes to state policy,” said Christopher Thornberg, Founding Partner of Beacon Economics and the forecast author. “When pessimistic public narratives take hold, no matter how false or overblown, elected leaders tend to veer off on impractical missions to fix problems that don’t really exist – at least not in the way these artificial narratives say they do.”

One of the most urgent, and real, challenges facing California this year is it’s colossal budget deficit of between $35 and $70 billion, depending on who you ask. But according to the new forecast, this gap is not a function of the state’s economy, which is growing, it is the obvious (and oft repeated) result of a volatile revenue system that badly needs to be overhauled.

“California loves soak-the-rich policies, and our high marginal tax rate on high-income earners means that when financial markets are hot, revenues surge, but when asset values fall or crash, it cuts deeply into the state’s tax haul,” said Thornberg. “On top of that, we have a mishmash of band aid type laws that have been put in place over the years which force a certain amount of spending, preventing lawmakers from saving for lean times.”

All that said, according to Thornberg, California’s biggest budgetary problem today is not with revenues but expenditures. “State spending is currently 40% higher than it was pre-pandemic, and as painful as it is, the deficit will not fully go away until either programs are cut back or new taxes are raised, both of which would be incredibly difficult to achieve,” he said.

In terms of the state’s economic future, perhaps California’s most burning dilemma is its low supply of housing, which has driven infamously high housing costs and a declining population, ergo workforce. According to the forecast, the only way to fix the problem is to sharply expand the pace of new housing supply. “This is a tremendously consequential issue for the economy and population of the state – a workforce cannot grow if there is nowhere for workers to live,” said Thornberg. “The inability to genuinely tackle our housing supply issue is slowing the mighty California economic machine and the effects we’ve started to see in the past few years will only grow worse.” 

View the new The Beacon Outlook California including full forecast tables here.

The REAL Journey Academies Entrepreneur High School Model / Inclusive Education Programming

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