There is continued evidence of a cyclical slowdown. China has already taken a large hit due to local policy decisions. Europe is dealing with the impact of the Russia/Ukraine conflict. The U.S. is feeling the impact of a Fed that has turned aggressive and is aiming for restrictive monetary policy. U.S. initial jobless claims were revised slightly higher & remained above their recent low at 231,000 last week. The U.S. manufacturing PMI new orders component moved into contraction territory at… View More
Investors are proceeding into the second half of 2022 with caution after the worst first six months to a year in decades. Risk-off sentiment was seen in most areas of the market, fueled by soaring inflation and the Fed's aggressive monetary policy to fears of slowing growth and increased borrowing costs. A much hoped for "soft landing" also hit some turbulence, with Fed Chair Jay Powell remarking this week "there is no guarantee that we can do that and it's obviously something that's going to be… View More
We've told people to watch the M2 measure of money in order to understand whether inflation will cool down or heat up. The Fed only releases this data on a monthly basis. They used to release it weekly, and we think not doing so robs the world of important information, nonetheless for now it is monthly. Today the Fed released May data on the M2 money supply and from our point of view, it was welcome news, signaling that the monetary surge propelling US inflation numbers to a four-decade high se… View More
Stocks advanced sharply last week (S&P 500 +6.5%), largely reversing the decline of the prior week. The rally stemmed from a technically oversold condition and some evidence that inflation might be peaking. The best performers were consumer discretionary (+8.3%) and healthcare (+8.2%); the worst performers were energy (-1.6%) and materials (+2.7%). WEEKLY ECONOMICS SUMMARY There is developing evidence of a cyclical slowdown. Metals prices (eg, copper) are turning lower. PMI’s are falling… View More
Fear that U.S. has to experience a severe recession to get inflation under control is the ‘wrong lesson’ of history, the St. Louis Fed president says St. Louis Fed President James Bullard spoke in Barcelona. The U.S. economy should continue to grow in the coming several months, said St. Louis Fed President James Bullard on Monday, playing down fear of a severe recession that some economists and market pros view as inevitable in the face of the central bank’s war against too-hot inflation. … View More