Mind the Macro

This week, we discuss the PCE report, new home sales, GDP, and PMI. Inflation continues to run well above the Federal Reserve's target. While personal income growth appeared strong, much of the increase reflected a one time government payment. Adjusting for this temporary boost, the savings rate fell to just 2.8%, suggesting that many consumers are increasingly stretched. New home sales surpri...

This week, we discuss recent housing market releases and the Federal Open Market Committee's latest decision under its new chair, Kevin Warsh. Housing starts fell to their lowest level since April 2020, at the onset of the Covid 19 pandemic. Much of the decline was driven by multifamily construction, a notoriously volatile component of the data. Even so, the report is consistent with broader e...

This week, we discuss rising inflation, the upcoming Federal Open Market Committee meeting, and the much anticipated SpaceX initial public offering. Consumer prices continued to accelerate in May, with headline CPI rising 4.2% from a year earlier and core CPI increasing 2.9%. Alternative measures of inflation, including median, trimmed mean, and sticky CPI, also pointed to broadening price pressur...

In this episode, we discuss the latest labor market releases, deteriorating consumer balance sheets, and Friday's decline in equity markets. While payroll growth exceeded expectations and the unemployment rate held steady at 4.3%, the composition of employment gains, the timing of the Memorial Day holiday, and several other details within the report continue to suggest a less encouraging pictu...

This week, we discuss downward revisions to GDP, persistent inflation and a renewed decline in the savings rate. Real GDP growth in the first quarter of 2026 was revised down from 2.1% to 1.6%, well below the consensus estimate of 2.2%. Meanwhile, inflation remained uncomfortably high. The PCE price index rose 3.8% from a year earlier, while core PCE increased 3.3%, both still far above the Federa...

This week, we discuss a series of perplexing market moves as inflation readings, oil prices, and Treasury yields all moved higher at once. Both headline CPI and PPI surprised to the upside, placing the Federal Reserve and its new Chair, Kevin Warsh, in an increasingly difficult position. According to the latest inflation nowcast from the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, inflation is expected to...

This week, we discuss the Employment Report, the Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey, and the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting. Although the headline employment figures appeared strong, the underlying composition was less reassuring. Nearly all of the payroll growth came from lower wage sectors and industries where workers are more likely to hold multiple jobs. In that sense, the rise in payro...

This week, we discuss the preliminary release of first quarter 2026 GDP, the PCE inflation report, the FOMC meeting and recent earnings releases, among other developments. Although headline GDP grew by 2%, the details were far less reassuring. Growth was concentrated in healthcare, technology and government spending. Without those three pillars, GDP would have been negative. The FOMC meeting was h...

This week, we discuss recent macroeconomic releases, including retail sales, pending home sales and the flash composite PMI, as well as Kevin Warsh’s Senate confirmation hearings and the war in Iran. At first glance, some of the data appeared to point to stronger growth. Under the hood, however, the figures continued to tilt toward stagflation. For instance, headline retail sales rose 1.7 percent,...

This week’s data offered a mixed but telling picture of the American economy, spanning the Beige Book, fresh readings on inflation and housing, and a further climb in equity markets. Housing, often a bellwether of cyclical momentum, continued to soften. Existing home sales fell short of expectations, while the Housing Market Index also declined, underscoring waning confidence among builders. Infla...

This week’s data offered a familiar tension: reassuring headlines paired with more concerning underlying dynamics. The latest employment report appeared strong at first glance. Payrolls exceeded expectations and the unemployment rate declined. Yet the details tell a different story. Research from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco suggests that unusually warm weather materially distorted th...

This week, we examine rising strains in subprime credit, an end of quarter market rally that may say more about flows than fundamentals, and a deteriorating situation in the Middle East, along with our normal overview of macroeconomic releases. Delinquencies in subprime debt have climbed to their highest level in over a decade. Yet the system is not as exposed as it once was. Subprime balances now...

This week turns on a series of disquieting signals across markets, from unusual moves in interest rate futures to mounting strains in private credit and renewed geopolitical risk surrounding Kharg Island, all against the backdrop of a sharp decline in equities. Uncertainty has come to dominate both bond and equity markets, each retreating markedly over the course of the week. Interest rate futures...

This week’s discussion surveys a more troubling turn in the data, as rising producer prices, falling new home sales, and a sharp steepening of the yield curve combine to reinforce a narrative of stagflation and a possible recession. Producer prices in February surprised to the upside and point to firmer core PCE in the near term. Inflationary pressures look set to intensify further in March, as hi...

This week, we discuss the war in Iran and a run of discouraging economic data, including falling payrolls, rising inflation and a downward revision to fourth quarter GDP. The most dramatic market development was in oil. Prices surged to $120 per barrel early Monday before plunging to $90 by Monday afternoon, the largest decline on record. The fall followed comments from President Trump suggesting...

This week we examine the implications of the war in Iran and the rising uncertainty now weighing on financial markets. Since our previous episode, titled “Inflation Intensifies Amid Credit Cracks,” the inflation outlook has deteriorated sharply as the conflict has pushed energy prices higher. In the near term, stronger inflation now appears almost unavoidable, arriving at a moment when the economi...

On this week’s episode, we examine signs that inflationary pressures are proving more stubborn than many had hoped. January’s Producer Price Index surprised to the upside, with headline prices rising 0.5 per cent over the month and the measure excluding food and energy increasing 0.8 per cent. We discuss why these pressures are likely to filter into the forthcoming Personal Consumption Expenditure...

This week the stagflation theme refused to fade. On Friday the Bureau of Economic Analysis released the PCE price index, the Federal Reserve’s preferred gauge of inflation. Headline and core PCE rose 2.9 per cent and 3.0 per cent respectively. More troubling than the levels was the recent momentum. Inflation has firmed over the past three months, an unwelcome development that further complicates t...

This week we examine the reassuring headlines in the employment and inflation reports, set against weakening retail sales and housing activity. On the surface, payroll growth and a softer CPI print suggested resilience. A closer look told a more fragile story. Nearly all net payroll gains were concentrated in health care and social services, leaving the broader labor market treading water. Inflati...

This week, we examine signs of economic cooling and a more demanding market backdrop. Private labor market reports from ADP, Revelio Labs, and Challenger, Gray and Christmas point to slowing hiring and softer demand for workers. Motor vehicle sales also weakened, and we argue the slowdown reflects more than poor weather, with a slowing consumer playing a larger role. Finally, we review recent earn...

This week, we address a broad set of developments shaping the macro landscape: Japan’s government bond strains, the weakening dollar, the state of the housing market, rising inflation risks, a fall in the consumer savings rate, and the key takeaways from the January FOMC press conference. We also revisit the latest GDP report, highlighting a notable anomaly - an outsized contribution from gold exp...

In this episode, recorded on Friday, January 16, we examine the inflation outlook and the growing influence of geopolitics on financial markets. A superficially benign headline CPI reading obscures a firmer underlying inflationary trend that is likely to assert itself later in the year. Other inflation gauges are already running hotter, raising questions about whether the CPI is understating price...

This week, we examine a run of key labor market releases alongside the latest GDP and productivity data. The Employment Situation report showed nonfarm payroll growth coming in below expectations, capping off the weakest year for job creation since 2020 and the weakest non-recessionary year since 2003. While much of the commentary celebrated the headline GDP figure, we were left with more question...

In this episode, recorded on December 19, 2025, we examine the latest retail sales, employment, and CPI reports. Retail sales were flat on the month, underscoring a continued pullback in consumer spending as sentiment deteriorates and labor-market momentum slows. The employment report was more troubling than the headline figures suggest. The unemployment rate rose to 4.6% in November, while payrol...

On this December 12 episode, we turn to the latest JOLTS report and, more importantly, the decisions and tone emerging from the Federal Open Market Committee. Job openings surprised modestly on the upside, yet were largely unchanged from the previous month. The more telling signal came from the quits rate, a gauge the Federal Reserve treats as a window into the confidence of American workers. Quit...