RISKY BUSINESS Lead lining around US data By Jephraim P Gundzik The Asia Times As a means to justify the dizzying rally of US equity markets, economists and investors have pinned their hopes on an economic rebound in the second half of 2007. Such a rebound is exceedingly unlikely. Though mystical core inflation appears tame, broader price measures indicate that inflation is accelerating. In addition to undercutting real gross domestic product (GDP) growth, accelerating inflation will sap already weakening private consumption expenditures, leading the economy into recession in the months ahead and prompt a very sharp correction in overvalued equity markets. Economists and investors are ignoring obvious signs that America has already entered a prolonged period of economic weakness. First-quarter real gross domestic product growth was revised sharply lower last week to a paltry 0.6% growth from the fourth quarter of 2006. Leading this weakness was further sharp contraction of investment. In particular, the collapse of residential investment, the product of ongoing correction in the US housing market, continued unabated. The only seemingly bright spot in the GDP data was the upward revision of real personal consumption expenditure growth, which galloped ahead at a stunning rate of 4.4%. Market players quickly assumed that unusually strong private consumption growth would continue throughout the remainder of 2007, forming the foundation of a formidable economic rebound. This assumption completely disregards the increasingly strong headwinds America’s insatiable consumers are facing. Over the last several years, surging home prices underpinned strong private consumption growth by rapidly increasing home equity. Homeowners became equity drunk, regularly tapping their growing home equity via mortgage refinancing. This party was so good that America’s equity drunks refused to leave, though home prices began to fall in late 2006 - a decline that has accelerated in 2007. Rising interest rates, surging mortgage defaults and much tighter credit control among lenders strongly suggest that the US housing market will continue to weaken, driving home prices and home equity lower in the months ahead. In addition to contracting home equity, accelerating inflation is also quickly thinning the wallets of American consumers. Like starry-eyed lovers, market players have embraced core inflation as the definitive indicator of price trends in America. While core inflation may have once been useful for shaping interest rate policy at the Federal Reserve, its utility has been greatly undermined by the continual advance of energy prices over the last several years. More recently, accelerating energy price inflation has begun to pull food price inflation higher, further diminishing the usefulness of core inflation as an overall indicator of price trends. The growing economic irrelevance of core inflation was demonstrated in last week’s GDP data. Economists and investors were elated that core personal consumption expenditure (PCE) inflation only ticked slightly higher to 2.2%. At the same time, however, the GDP deflator soared to 4%, its highest level since 1991. Unlike core inflation, the broad GDP deflator has a real world application. It is used to “deflate” nominal GDP growth into real or inflation-adjusted terms. Though core inflation in the US, which strips out energy and food price changes, may remain relatively stable over the next several months, broad inflation measures, such as the GDP deflator, will surpass 5%. This acceleration of inflation will lead to contracting real GDP growth, which is another name for economic recession. Continued advances of energy and food prices will pull the GDP deflator higher. In addition to exceedingly low gasoline stockpiles in the US and continued very strong energy demand growth, increasing instability in the Middle East and Africa are likely to push crude oil prices higher over the next several months. Crude oil prices could top $100 per barrel if the North American hurricane season is as active as currently forecast. Rising petroleum-related energy prices are driving, and will continue to drive, food prices much higher. Rising energy prices have created soaring biofuel demand, which reduces the availability and increases the price of grains and oilseeds. Higher grain and oilseed prices are forcing meat and milk prices upward, a phenomenon that will continue for many months to come. Stable core inflation also belies higher prices suggested by the steady rise of inflation expectations among Americans. In the past two months, yields on Treasury Bonds and Notes have moved sharply higher, with 10-year yields near 5%. The primary factor behind rising bond yields is the expectation that inflation will increase in the future. Indicators of consumer confidence bear out this increase of inflation expectations. The University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment for May showed that Americans expect inflation to increase to 3.3%. The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index for May showed Americans expect inflation to reach 5.5% in 2007, up from 5.1% in the April survey. Further evidence of rapidly rising inflation can be seen in recent surveys of manufacturing and service sector activity in the US by the Institute for Supply Management, which showed prices paid in both sectors rising rapidly. During the second half of 2007, American consumers will be greatly challenged by rising inflation and interest rates and the continued decline of home equity. These factors will produce significant retrenchment of personal consumption expenditure, which will trigger a chain reaction of contracting investment, weakening output and rising unemployment. Few can read the economic writing on the wall in America and its negative implications for US equity markets. Rather than engage in home-grown soul searching, America’s most prominent financial market commentators, including former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan, are oddly more concerned about China’s so-called equity market bubble. China’s equity markets have had a spectacular run over the past 18 months. However, such a bull market is not unusual for a developing country where economic growth is in the neighborhood of 10% annually. Such rapid economic growth produces equally rapid profit growth and equity market capitalization growth, which translates into higher equity prices. Alan Greenspan’s fret about China’s stock market is more applicable to US equity markets, which continue to advance despite ever weakening economic fundamentals. Overheated US equity markets are likely to face a very sharp reversal in the second half of 2007 as economic reality bites investors hard. Jephraim P Gundzik, president, Condor Advisers Inc. Condor Advisers provides emerging markets investment risk analysis to individuals and institutions globally. http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Global_Economy/IF07Dj02.html |