10 May 2012 16:27 [Source: ICIS news]
By Joe Kamalick
WASHINGTON (ICIS)--Just as the ?xml:namespace>
Despite a rash of early disappointing and even worrisome data reports about the nation’s economic performance in the first quarter this year, subsequent forecasts suggest that the
On the downside, the Commerce Department reported recently that US gross domestic product (GDP) growth fell to 2.2% in the first quarter of this year.
That pace of growth was off considerably from the near-normal 3% GDP expansion seen in the fourth quarter of 2011, and it suggested that the recovery could be weakening and might be at risk of stalling.
There were other warning signs as well.
The pulse of commerce index (PCI) compiled monthly by the
That narrow advance for April followed a 0.3% gain in March and the 0.7% advance in February, indicating that the pace of the
UCLA and its research partner Ceridian track credit card purchases of diesel fuel by trucking companies across the country, so the PCI is seen as a real-time measure of the flow of raw materials, goods-in-process and finished products.
Ceridian noted that the cumulative PCI for the three months February through April “is below the previous three months by 1.2% at an annualised rate”.
The PCI for April also was 1.9% below the index for the same month of 2011.
In a similar but broader measure of the
The TSI combines the tonnage or volume of product movement by for-hire trucking firms, rail cargo, air freight, traffic on inland waterways and pipelines flow. Here too, this is a data point that in an economic recovery would be heading up, not down.
Perhaps most troubling,
The
The
Then the rate of jobs growth eased in February, and in March, and has edged lower still with the April employment report.
Again, not a direction associated with recovery.
That said, there are more recent data and surveys suggesting that things could get better in coming months.
A key outlook issued this week by the Institute for Supply Management (ISM) predicted that the
The institute said that overall revenue gains in 2012 are expected to be nearly 5% better than last year for both manufacturing and non-manufacturing business.
In its regular semi-annual economic forecast, the institute said that two-thirds of its movement in raw materials costs expected for the balance of 2012, “manufacturers are poised to grow revenues and contain costs through the remainder of the year”..
The National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) also reported this week that small business owners across the
However, the two point gain in NFIB’s index of small business optimism for April, rising to 94.5, puts the sampling of small business sentiment just where it was a year ago, so the net gain has been zero.
The measure of confidence among small business owners is critical because their firms are the principal engines of job growth in the nation’s economy.
Despite the upturn in small business confidence, NFIB chief economist Bill Dunkelberg was not particularly sanguine.
“GDP and employment growth news has not been good,” he noted, adding: “The euro debt crisis continues to make news, and Congress leaves us on an identical path [with] huge deficits, a terrifying amount of liquidity at the Fed [the US central bank], and no indication that anything positive will be done.”
The outcome of national elections in France and especially Greece last Sunday have suggested to many observers that Europe’s simmering sovereign debt crisis is quickly coming to a full boil and could blow the lid off the euro.
The French president-elect, Francois Hollande, won on a promise to reject European austerity measures, raise taxes on the rich and increase government spending. It remains to be seen whether he can do that without increasing
But it is in
The winning parties in
If
A new European recession, which is already under way, would accelerate.
According to US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, the European debt crisis poses a major global economic risk and could cause “significant damage” to the
“The crisis in
Geithner said that while US banks and other financial institutions now have little direct exposure to
“Europe is so large and so closely integrated with the
So if the euro falls, the resulting European financial tsunami would wash up on US shores and likely swamp this country’s still wobbly recovery.