Policy, politics and oil: The themes shaping markets in 2015

Policy tightening and stimulus, falling commodity prices and elections - this year is likely to be shaped by conflicting forces, explains Premier's David Hambidge.

The Federal Reserve looks likely to raise US interest rates for the first time since 2006 sometime this year, and until very recently the majority of economists were also expecting the Bank of England to hike rates later this year. However, with CPI falling to a joint record low of 0.5% in December, expectations are that interest rates will not rise until the spring of 2016 at the earliest. Two areas where we certainly will not see any tightening of monetary policy this year are Japan and the eurozone; the Bank of Japan shocked the market by increasing its QE programme in November whi...