Tilney investment director Ben Seager-Scott also believes there is no simple yes or no answer.
“The US is seeing fiscal stimulus, government spending, and tighter monetary policy which, combined, can lead to stagflation,” he said.
“That said, this scenario usually comes out of high unemployment and we aren’t seeing that.”
A bigger concern for Seager-Scott was long-term stagnation.
“We believe secular stagnation driven by a low growth, low inflation, low investment returns and low interest rates is more likely than stagflation,” he said.
“The main structural problem is global debt. If this was reduced it might push a few zombie companies to the wall, and helping to speed up fundamentals in the developed economies.”
Architas investment director Adrian Lowcock argued that the likelihood of stagflation depends on the time line in question.
He said: “Inflation and growth in the developed world is currently pretty strong but there are drags on all these economies long term.
“Aging populations and disruptive technologies (which add little to a country’s GDP) are probably the two most obvious problems.”
