4 Potential Positive Surprises in a World of Worry
I know it’s all the rage to talk about all the economic negatives these days, but what if things turn out “better than expected”? Something to ponder via Print Turner:
“Amidst all the worries, what are some potentially positive surprises?
- Energy prices continue to moderate, putting more spending money in consumer pockets, reducing corporate operating costs and boosting economic growth.
- U.S. economic data such as auto sales, business loans and employment continue modest improvement. New home construction and sales, spurred on by record low interest rates, meaningfully contribute to growth.
- Emerging market countries (China, India, Latin America, etc.) take stronger actions to stimulate economic growth in their own countries thereby spearheading renewed global growth.
- Stabilized and improving home values add to the positive “wealth effect” for U.S. households for the first time in five years. This is the most unexpected and welcomed economic surprise.”
Cullen Roche
Mr. Roche is the Founder of Orcam Financial Group, LLC. Orcam is a financial services firm offering research, private advisory, institutional consulting and educational services.
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11 Comments
5) A reborn Elvis teaches us how to reach endless happiness. In a few weeks all is solved and life just an endless rock and roll party. Beer will be free for all.
What about whiskey?
All you need to know about wiskey
http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Whiskey_Speech
Cool speech
I understand, appreciate and heed the info. However, I’m not in “fear”, I’m simply bearish. I’ve been very bearish since 2006. It is much worse than I thought and it’s NOT over. This has been a huge rally in a long term bear market. As a “trader” I don’t distinguish between bear and bull as having anything to do with fear. My only relationship with fear has to do with loosing a LOT of money… and I’ve done that a few times.
You are way behind the curve. There are 4 aircraft carrier battlegroups in the Persian Gulf. Any witless person can see what’s coming….WW3 & $200 oil
Really? I count two. The Stennis is relieving the Enterprise which is being decommissioned, and the Eisenhower is relieving the Lincoln. And they’ve been called Carrier Strike Groups for ten years.
If you’re really worried about conflict with Iran, you pay attention to what’s going on with the Military Sealift Command – logistics is the heart of war. If you’re just worried about airstrikes, rest easy, patriot: there’s no way the F-18s would form the spearhead against Iran or even be particularly useful. The air defenses are too good and the F-18 cannot carry the kind of munitions needed to knock out Iranian nuclear facilities – they make some of the best concrete in the world and you need really, really big bombs.
The carriers are just in the neighborhood to look tough. I’d be more worried when they leave: if you’re going to start a shooting war with Iran, you can’t have your surface ships chilling within missile range, because they Iranians would sink them.
Edmund, it’s good of you to provide a dose of reality. However, facts never impede the man who lives in a fantasy world from carrying on with his delusions. Any witless person can see this, as someone recently declared here.
HelIx12 is dead on. Obama is a Kenyan communist. The world is ending. Buy gold. Oh, and read Zero Hedge.
As Woody Allen said to Christopher Walken, “I’m due back on the planet earth now.”
As far as housing prices go, let’s not be too greedy. “Stabilized” would be extremely helpful at this point. “Improving” may be a ways off, but that’s ok.
Energy prices reflect economic strength or weakness.
JJButler has dispatched the oil “good news,” but the other notes of optimism you cite are all misleading, too.
“U.S. Economic Data” are largely fictional in the modern era, particularly in a presidential election year. For instance, GM (Government Motors) is “channel stuffing” inventory onto dealer lots to the point where they have 200+-day supplies of some vehicles. Meanwhile, Volt workers are being laid off because sales are not catching fire and the cars are. (Under the “burning car” category, see also “Ford Escape,” which we now know is especially aptly named because the company is advising owners of more than a million of them to “escape” from them before they burn alive in them.)
China and India are both sucking air, and Latin America, in case you hadn’t noticed is devolving back into a collection of Banana Republics, as more and more nations there are taken over by socialist and/or totalitarian regimes.
The reason home prices appear to be rising is that few lower price homes are selling now, so prices are skewed upward by the fact that a larger percentage of selling homes are in the middle and upper price ranges. Also, they’re only rising on a month-over-month basis; year-over-year comparisons continue to decline, and the number of homeowners who are “underwater” in their mortgages is still rising. To find out you’re only $98,000 underwater this month–down from $100,000 last month–might make you fell less poor, but it hardly makes you feel a “wealth effect.”
You can’t put enough lipstick on the U.S. or world economies to pretend we’re not mucking about in a hog wallow.
Thanks Diogenes….sounds like a great time to buy.