Chinese exports in December were better than feared, declining by just 1.4% against some expectations for an 8% decline. However, there were significant questions in the data, starting with year-end contract projections, unverified accounts that don’t match other countries’ trade figures and the return of Hong Kong as a potential falsification point. As ZeroHedge points out, without the huge jump [...]
The Census Bureau released its estimates for November US trade. It was yet another debacle for the FOMC narrative about an economy poised to overheat. November was the month in between the two FOMC meetings where they first declared (October) risks diminished and then (December) recovery conditions fully met. Instead, both exports and imports in that interim shrunk considerably, casting [...]
In the manufacturing sector we find the most supreme test of economic credentials. Despite what is clearly taking place, the mainstream, orthodox outlook and assessment continues to dominate. There isn’t any doubt anymore about the manufacturing sector, as recession not only is broad enough there on its own it continues to deepen and darken. Yet, because Janet Yellen declared the [...]
From the perspective of foreign economies, the primary economic problem is US consumers. That sets up a contradiction as noted earlier today with durable goods estimates; economists think US consumers are quite healthy and the contraction in manufacturing is due to foreign economies. The inventory imbalance, or bloat as it was aptly described, cannot be an overseas problem and therefore [...]
China’s trade estimates continue the trend of the global economy pushing closer to recession, assuming that it is not already there. We know that the lower part of the global supply chain below Chinese manufacturing and assembly, the resources and materials flow, has already been pushed beyond simple recession in some places, like Brazil, into defining a new disastrous economic [...]
Once more we find no end in sight to the Chinese slowdown. To complete the weekly sweep of highly negative Chinese accounts, the major three released today were unfortunately complimentary to those already publicized. Only retail sales accelerated and by the smallest increment; in context, however, at 11% retail sales are still lower than the worst month of the China’s [...]
The unrelenting economic decline in China is finally getting the attention of economists and the media as something more than a big problem “for them.” Imports declined by 18.8% in October after having contracted by 20.5% in August. On the export side, Chinese goods sent abroad fell 6.9% year-over-year in dollars which confirms that the contraction is not China’s alone [...]
Much like global “inflation”, if you set out to find global “demand” you will be hard pressed to find it. QE was supposed to be a huge boost to aggregate demand, through inflation expectations, yet the score in 2015 is hugely negative. Overseas problems are not unfortunately so remote, despite all mainstream protestations, as you can simply trace it all [...]
There must be a universal speech template included in the monetary textbook that is shared among the various central banks. On September 28, 2015, Haruhiko Kuroda, Governor of the Bank of Japan, delivered a speech that wasn’t just similar to the press conference Janet Yellen had endured only a week or so before, it was a close enough replica that [...]
The US Producer Price Index declined 0.5% month-over-month in September, much farther than the 0.2% drop expected by economists (statisticians, really). With retail sales providing little positive emphasis even among the large segment of commentary focused exclusively on the monthly variation rather than the intense consequence of wider context, the idea that the Fed will confirm the final stage of [...]
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