Total Household Net Worth As A Percent Of GDP 4Q 2016

The following chart is from the CalculatedRisk post of March 9, 2017 titled “Fed’s Flow of Funds:  Household Net Worth increased in Q4.” It depicts Total Household Net Worth as a Percent of GDP.  The underlying data is from the Federal Reserve’s Z.1 report, “Financial Accounts of the United States“: (click on chart to enlarge image) As seen in …

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Building Financial Danger – March 11, 2017 Update

My overall analysis indicates a continuing elevated and growing level of financial danger which contains many worldwide and U.S.-specific “stresses” of a very complex nature. I have written numerous posts in this site concerning both ongoing and recent “negative developments.”  These developments, as well as other exceedingly problematic conditions, have presented a highly perilous economic environment …

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Broad-Based Indicators Of Economic Activity

The Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) and the Aruoba-Diebold-Scotti Business Conditions Index (ADS Index) are two broad-based economic indicators that I regularly feature in this site. The short-term and long-term trends of each continue to be notable. Doug Short, in his blog post of March 6, 2017, titled “The Philly Fed ADS Index Business …

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Charts Of Equities’ Performance Since March 9, 2009 And January 1, 1980 – March 2, 2017 Update

In the March 9, 2012 post (“Charts of Equities’ Performance Since March 9, 2009 And January 1, 1980“) I highlighted two charts for reference purposes. Below are those two charts, updated through the latest daily closing price. The first is a daily chart of the S&P500 (shown in green), as well as five prominent (AAPL, IBM, …

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Long-Term Stock Charts DJIA, DJTA, S&P500, Nasdaq Indexes

StockCharts.com maintains long-term historical charts of various major stock market indices, interest rates, currencies, commodities, and economic indicators. As a long-term reference, below are charts depicting various stock market indices for the dates shown.  All charts are depicted on a monthly basis using a LOG scale. (click on charts to enlarge images)(charts courtesy of StockCharts.com) …

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Chicago Fed National Financial Conditions Index (NFCI)

The St. Louis Fed’s Financial Stress Index (STLFSI) is one index that is supposed to measure stress in the financial system.  Its reading as of the February 23, 2017 update (reflecting data through February 17, 2017) is -1.274. Of course, there are a variety of other measures and indices that are supposed to measure financial stress and other …

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U.S. Dollar Decline – March 1, 2017 Update

U.S. Dollar weakness is a foremost concern of mine.  As such, I have extensively written about it.  I am very concerned that the actions being taken to “improve” our economic situation will dramatically weaken the Dollar.  Should the Dollar substantially decline from here, as I expect, the negative consequences will far outweigh any benefits.  The negative impact of a substantial …

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Low Interest Rates And The Stock Market Bubble

The existence of various immensely large asset bubbles continues to be among the most worrisome aspects of today’s financial and economic system. I have written extensively about this asset bubbles issue. One aspect that is particularly notable is the cause(s) of such bubbles.  As I wrote in the January 9, 2017 post (“Low Interest Rates …

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