Recession Watch with Fexingo: Economic Cycles, Indicators, and What Slowdowns Mean

Episode 57 of Recession Watch with Fexingo examines an unusual recession indicator: rising job openings. With the latest JOLTS data showing 7.6 million openings in April 2026, up from 6.9 million in March, Lucas and Luna explore why a tight labor market can actually precede a downturn. They discuss the 'labor market churn' phenomenon from past cycles, the role of energy cost shocks from the Iran c...

Lucas and Luna dig into a recession indicator that often flies under the radar: spot trucking rates. As of mid-June 2026, spot rates for dry van trailers have fallen 12 percent year-over-year, while contract rates are starting to slip. The hosts explain why trucking is an early-cycle bellwether for consumer demand and industrial activity, and what the current data suggests about the health of the...

Episode 55 of Recession Watch with Fexingo dives into a lesser-known recession indicator: the surge in credit card credit limits. Lucas and Luna explain how banks have been aggressively raising limits on consumer credit cards since late 2025, despite rising delinquencies. They connect this to data on consumer debt and the latest CPI print showing 4.2% inflation. The hosts explore whether this avai...

In this episode of Recession Watch, Lucas and Luna drill into the May 2026 wholesale price data released on June 11: a 1.1% month-over-month jump, driven by energy costs tied to the Iran conflict. They contrast this with the still-cooling consumer price backdrop and the ECB's surprise rate hike, the first since 2023. The hosts argue that the producer price surge may be the missing piece that shift...

Episode 53 digs into a recession indicator that has historically preceded every downturn since the 1970s: the Institute for Supply Management's Manufacturing PMI, specifically the New Orders minus Inventories spread. Lucas walks through why that spread has been negative for seven consecutive months as of May 2026 — something that hasn't happened outside a recession since the early 2000s — and why...

Most recession watchers track unemployment, manufacturing PMI, or the yield curve. But there's a lesser-known leading indicator buried in the Institute for Supply Management's monthly reports: the vendor deliveries index. When suppliers slow down — and lead times stretch — it often signals that demand is overheating, not contracting. In this episode, Lucas and Luna dissect the ISM vendor deliverie...

The job market looks solid on the surface: unemployment at 4.3%, payrolls growing, and JOLTS job openings just jumped to 7.6 million, their highest level in over a year. But Lucas and Luna dig into the ratio of job openings to actual hires — a metric that has historically turned down before recessions. They walk through the April JOLTS data, the quits rate that’s still below pre-pandemic norms, an...

Episode 50 of Recession Watch digs into the trucking industry as a leading indicator for economic downturns. Hosts Lucas and Luna examine why spot freight rates have fallen 20% from last year, how the Cass Freight Index is flashing warning signs, and what the recent jump in trucking bankruptcies means for the broader economy. With specific references to the Cass Shipments Index and the For-Hire Tr...

In this episode of Recession Watch, Lucas and Luna break down the surprising May PPI surge of 1.1% — more than double expectations — driven by a spike in energy costs linked to the Iran conflict. They explore how wholesale price pressures can foreshadow consumer inflation, margin compression, and ultimately a recession. With real GDP growth at just 1.6% annually and the yield curve still inverted...

On this episode of Recession Watch, Lucas and Luna examine the small business optimism index from the National Federation of Independent Business, which just dropped to its lowest level since 2013. They discuss how the gap between what large corporations report and what Main Street feels has widened to a historic spread, and why that divergence may be the most telling recession signal right now. W...

Episode 47 of Recession Watch with Fexingo: Lucas and Luna drill into an underappreciated leading indicator — trucking employment data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. They unpack how the trucking sector has historically shed jobs months before broader payrolls turn negative, and why the recent 0.2% month-over-month dip in for-hire trucking jobs (reported May 8, 2026) could be flashing yellow....

In this episode of Recession Watch, Lucas and Luna dig into the May 2026 PPI report that came in much hotter than expected, with wholesale prices surging 1.1% month-over-month driven by energy costs. They explore what this means for the recession outlook, especially as the ECB just raised rates for the first time since 2023 in response to Iran-war-driven energy inflation. Lucas points to the tensi...

On June 11, 2026, the European Central Bank raised interest rates for the first time since 2023, driven by an energy price surge linked to geopolitical tensions. Lucas and Luna unpack what this means for global recession signals, especially with US consumer prices at 4.2% annually and the yield curve un-inverting. They focus on the ECB's dilemma: fighting inflation vs. risking a downturn, and how...

Episode 44 of Recession Watch with Fexingo. Lucas and Luna examine a leading recession indicator hiding in plain sight: layoffs at small businesses. Using data from ADP and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, they show how firms with fewer than 50 employees tend to cut jobs months before larger companies, making this an early warning signal that has flashed before every downturn since 2001. With the u...

Episode 43 of Recession Watch with Fexingo looks at a lesser-known recession indicator: the four-week moving average of initial jobless claims. Lucas and Luna discuss how smoothing out weekly volatility in claims data can reveal underlying trends before the headline number catches up, and why the current level—225,000 initial claims for the week ending May 30, 2026, up from 212,000 the prior week—...

Lucas and Luna dig into the New York Fed's Survey of Consumer Expectations, released June 8, 2026, which shows household worries about finances hitting their highest level since July 2022. They explore how one-year-ahead inflation expectations have crept up to 3.2%, even as actual CPI has moderated. The hosts discuss why this divergence matters for the Fed's next move, how rising inflation expecta...

This episode drills into the New York Fed's Survey of Consumer Expectations, which hit its most downbeat reading since July 2022. Lucas and Luna unpack what the Citi Pain Index reveals about how households are feeling right now — and why sentiment about personal finances is diverging from the official jobs data. They connect it to the VIX jump to 21, the 4.3 percent unemployment rate, and what it...

The yield curve has been inverted for over three years — the longest stretch on record. Now it's un-inverting. On June 8, 2026, the spread between the 10-year and 2-year Treasury yields hit 0.41 percentage points, widening from 0.38 a few days earlier. In this episode, Lucas and Luna break down what yield curve un-inversions have signaled in the past, why this one might be different, and what it m...

Consumer credit card delinquencies are rising toward levels that preceded the 2008 financial crisis and the early 1990s recession. In this episode, Lucas and Luna examine the latest New York Fed data showing households worried about finances at the highest level since July 2022. They drill into the specific delinquency rates for different income brackets, why banks are already tightening lending s...

Episode 38 of Recession Watch with Fexingo dives into a leading indicator that is flashing red: consumer credit card delinquencies turning serious. Lucas and Luna break down how the transition from 30-day to 90-day late payments signals real financial strain among lower-income households, especially as the labor market shows pockets of strength. With the VIX spiking 34% in a week and the yield cur...

Episode 37 of Recession Watch with Fexingo dives into consumer credit card debt as a leading recession indicator. Lucas and Luna examine the latest data on revolving credit, delinquency rates, and how the consumer balance sheet is cracking under persistent inflation and higher interest rates. With the VIX spiking 34% in five days and the yield curve still inverted, they connect the dots between ho...

Episode 36 of Recession Watch with Fexingo examines initial jobless claims, which have risen from 212,000 to 225,000 in a single week. Lucas and Luna explore why this relatively small uptick matters more than markets currently price in, comparing it to previous cycles and connecting it to broader labor market softening—including the ADP vs BLS divergence and long-term unemployment trends. They dis...

Lucas and Luna dive into a leading indicator that has preceded every U.S. recession since the 1970s: temporary help services employment. With the latest May 2026 payroll data showing a sharp drop in temp staffing even as overall job growth remains positive, they unpack why companies cut temporary workers first, what the current numbers signal, and whether this time is different. Drawing on Bureau...

With the May jobs report dropping tomorrow, Lucas and Luna drill into a recession indicator most analysts overlook: the widening gap between ADP's private payroll estimate and the official BLS nonfarm payroll count. In April, ADP reported just 122,000 private jobs added, while BLS showed 172,000. That 50,000-job divergence has historically preceded every recession since 2008. They trace the data b...

Episode 33 of Recession Watch examines the surge in long-term unemployment, a lagging indicator that may be flashing a recession warning the market is ignoring. Lucas and Luna discuss the latest JOLTS data showing job openings rebounding to 7.6 million, but with long-term unemployed workers making up a growing share—now near 22% of total unemployed. They unpack why this metric matters: the longer...