America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
U.S. Dollar weakness is a foremost concern of mine. As such, I have extensively written about it, including commentary on the “A Substantial U.S. Dollar Decline And Consequences” page. 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, …
Various surveys, economic growth projections, and market risk indicators portray a short period (through mid-2020) of substantial U.S. economic decline, followed by a sustained significant economic rebound and then financial system stability for the foreseeable future. However, there are various indications – many of which have been discussed on this site – that this very …
For reference, below is a chart of the St. Louis Fed Price Pressures Measures – Deflation Probability [FRED STLPPMDEF] through August 2020. While I do not necessarily agree with the current readings of the measure, I view this as a proxy of U.S. deflation probability. A description of this measure, as seen in FRED: This …
Advisor Perspectives had a post of August 28, 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 to be …
Recently Deloitte released their “CFO Signals” “High-Level Summary” report for the 3rd Quarter of 2020. As seen in page 3 of the report, there were 155 survey respondents. As stated: “Each quarter (since 2Q10), CFO Signals has tracked the thinking and actions of CFOs representing many of North America’s largest and most influential companies. All respondents are …
In the last post (“2nd 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 (August 27, 2020) GDP release (Q2 2020, Second Estimate) was accompanied by the Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) Corporate Profits report (preliminary estimate) for the 2nd 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 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 August 20, 2020 update (reflecting data through August 14, 2020) is -.4647. Of course, there are a variety of other measures and indices that are supposed to measure financial stress and …
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 July 2020, updated on August 26, 2020. This value is $230,672 ($ Millions): (click on charts to …
As a reference for long-term house price index trends, below is a chart, updated with the most current data (through June) from the CalculatedRisk blog post of August 25, 2020 titled “Case-Shiller : National House Price Index increased 4.3% year-over-year in June“: _________ I post various indicators and indices because I believe they should be …