Deutsche Bank's global head of FX research sticks with bearish dollar view

LONDON, Feb 11 (Reuters) - Deutsche Bank's global head of FX research stuck with a bearish view on the dollar in a note published on Wednesday, the first seen by media since U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent commented on the analyst's Greenland report last month.

In his latest note, George Saravelos discussed how the dollar, viewed as a traditional safe-haven asset, performs when U.S. equity markets sell off.

He noted that the average correlation between the dollar and U.S. equity markets has historically been closer to zero, but that correlation has broken down in the past year.

His short note appeared to be the first distributed to the media since a January 18 note titled "Thoughts on Greenland", though Saravelos had authored a blog on the dollar in late January.

Deutsche Bank did not immediately respond to a Reuters email to confirm whether this was the case. Saravelos also did not reply immediately when contacted by Reuters.

In the January 18 note, Saravelos raised the possibility of European investors selling U.S. assets in response to President Donald Trump's threats to impose tariffs on some European countries that opposed his effort to acquire Greenland.

Speaking in Davos just a few days later, Bessent said Deutsche Bank's DBKGn.DE CEO Christian Sewing had called him to distance the bank from the analyst's report.

At the time, a Deutsche Bank spokesperson said the bank's research is independent.

In his note published on Wednesday, Saravelos said his bearish view on the dollar was based on a positive global growth environment that has hurt the notion of U.S. exceptionalism.

"We have so far chosen to emphasize currencies that are most sensitive to these benign global growth dynamics such as AUD, the Scandis and EM FX," he said, referring to the Australian dollar, Scandinavian and emerging market currencies.

"So long as the current positive global growth environment persists, it should continue to favour higher dollar hedge ratios and the ongoing bear market in the dollar should have more to play out."