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Wed, 5/1/24
Jay Powell - “I don’t see the stag, or the ’flation”
Fri, 5/3/24
The Stag
- Payrolls up 175k, and only 5k in leisure & hospitality, February + March revised down
- Unemployment up to 3.9%
- Manufacturing PMI slips to 49.2 (< 50 is recessionary)
- Much anecdotal evidence of hiring slowing dramatically, consumer behavior eroding and debt exploding, etc.
The 'flation
- Wage growth +3.9% y-o-y
- CPI +3.5%
- Core PCE +2.8% y-o-y, but 0.3% (x12 = 3.6%) m-o-m
- Owner's equivalent rent up >6%
- Crude oil prices hovering ~$80/bbl
Frankly, Jay's sounding a bit like "Mr Transitory" again to me. Could the Fed once again be a day late and a dollar short to the table? And, what will be the effects of "higher for longer"? CRE implosion? Third-world country's going under from the stronger dollar? Annihilation of the consumer here in The States? All of the above?
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