America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
The St. Louis Fed’s Financial Stress Index (STLFSI2) is one index that is supposed to measure stress in the financial system. Its reading as of the November 19, 2020 update (reflecting data through November 13, 2020) is -.8328. Of course, there are a variety of other measures and indices that are supposed to measure financial stress and …
Read moreChicago Fed National Financial Conditions Index (NFCI)
Many people place emphasis on Durable Goods New Orders as a prominent economic indicator and/or leading economic indicator. For reference, below are two charts depicting this measure. First, from the St. Louis Fed site (FRED), a chart through October 2020, updated on November 25, 2020. This value is $240,769 ($ Millions): (click on charts to …
Read moreDurable Goods New Orders – Long-Term Charts Through October 2020
Advisor Perspectives had a post of November 25, 2020 (“Michigan Consumer Sentiment…“) that displays the latest Conference Board Consumer Confidence and Thomson/Reuters University of Michigan Consumer Sentiment Index charts. They are presented below: (click on charts to enlarge images) – While I don’t believe that confidence surveys should be overemphasized, I find these readings and trends …
Read moreConsumer Confidence Surveys – As Of November 25, 2020
In the last post (“3rd Quarter 2020 Corporate Profits“) I displayed, for reference purposes, a long-term chart depicting Corporate Profits After Tax. There are many ways to view this measure, both on an absolute as well as relative basis. One relative measure is viewing Corporate Profits as a Percentage of GDP. I feel that this …
Today’s (November 25, 2020) GDP release (Q3 2020, Second Estimate) was accompanied by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) Corporate Profits report (preliminary estimate) for the 3rd Quarter. Of course, there are many ways to adjust and depict overall Corporate Profits. For reference purposes, here is a chart from the St. Louis Federal Reserve (FRED) …
The following is an update of various indicators that are supposed to predict and/or depict economic activity. These indicators have been discussed in previous blog posts: The November 2020 Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) updated as of November 23, 2020: The CFNAI, with a current reading of .83: source: Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Chicago Fed National …
Perhaps the main reason that I write of our economic situation is that I continue to believe, based upon various analyses, that our economic situation is in many ways misunderstood. While no one likes to contemplate a future rife with economic adversity, current and future economic problems must be properly recognized and rectified if high-quality, …
Read moreThe U.S. Economic Situation – November 23, 2020 Update
For reference purposes, below are two sets of charts depicting growth in the money supply. The first shows the MZM (Money Zero Maturity), defined in FRED as the following: M2 less small-denomination time deposits plus institutional money funds.Money Zero Maturity is calculated by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. Here is the “MZM Money …
S&P500 earnings trends and estimates are a notably important topic, for a variety of reasons, at this point in time. FactSet publishes a report titled “Earnings Insight” that contains a variety of information including the trends and expectations of S&P500 earnings. For reference purposes, here are two charts as seen in the “Earnings Insight” report of November …
As many are aware, Refinitiv publishes earnings estimates for the S&P500. (My other posts concerning S&P earnings estimates can be found under the S&P500 Earnings tag) The following estimates are from Exhibit 24 of the “S&P500 Earnings Scorecard” (pdf) of November 17, 2020, and represent an aggregation of individual S&P500 component “bottom up” analyst forecasts. For reference, the …