America's Economic Future – A Discussion By Ted Kavadas
Here is an update on various indicators that are supposed to predict and/or depict economic activity. These indicators have been discussed in previous blog posts: The January Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI)(pdf) updated as of January 26, 2012: – The USA TODAY/IHS Global Insight Economic Outlook Index: An excerpt from the January 3 update titled “Index …
On January 10, The Conference Board released its 4th Quarter CEO Confidence Survey. The overall measure of CEO Confidence was at 49, up from 42 in the third quarter. Notable excerpts from this January 10 Press Release include: Says Lynn Franco, Director of The Conference Board Consumer Research Center: “The bounce back in CEO Confidence in …
I found President Obama’s State of the Union Address last night to contain some noteworthy comments. While I could comment extensively on many parts of the speech, for now I will indicate excerpts that I found most relevant, and may comment upon them at a future point. I am highlighting these excerpts for many reasons; it should …
Just a quick administrative note… For those unaware, I maintain a separate site that mirrors all of the blog posts found on this site. This second site can be accessed should there be problems accessing this site. Here is the link to this second site: http://economicgreenfield.blogspot.com/
In various past posts I have written of the challenges businesses face in pricing, given today’s economic environment. One aspect that I mentioned in the December 16, 2010 and April 25, 2011 posts was how the PPI (Producer Price Index) growth was significantly outpacing that of the CPI. Since those posts, this PPI-CPI growth rate issue has remained notable. …
Recently Deloitte released their “CFO Signals” report for 4th Quarter 2011. As seen in page 2 of the full (pdf) report, “Eighty four CFOs responded during the two weeks ended November 29. Over 70% are from public companies, and over 75% are from companies with more than $1B in annual revenue.” Here are some excerpts that …
On March 28, 2011 I wrote a post (“The STLFSI“) about the STLFSI (St. Louis Fed’s Financial Stress Index) which is supposed to measure stress in the financial system. Here is the most recent chart. This chart was last updated on January 19, incorporating data from 12-31-93 to 1-13-12 on a weekly basis. The present …
On January 18, Gallup published poll results titled “Half in U.S. Feel Worse Off Financially.” The poll asked various questions, including this one : Would you say that you are financially better off now than you were a year ago, or are you financially worse off now? An excerpt from the results, as discussed in …
The January Wall Street Journal Economic Forecast Survey was published on January 13, 2012. The headline is “Economists Split Over Additional Fed Action.” The commentary largely focuses on when, and if, the Federal Reserve will do another round of “bond purchases.” An excerpt from the article: Of the 22 economists who expect more bond buying …
As I stated in my July 12, 2010 post (“ECRI WLI Growth History“): For a variety of reasons, I am not as enamored with ECRI’s WLI and WLI Growth measures as many are. However, I do think the measures are important and deserve close monitoring and scrutiny. The movement of the ECRI WLI and WLI, …