. . Laird Research - Economics May 16, 2016 Where we are now ........................ 1 Indicators for US Economy ................... 2 Global Financial Markets .................... 4 US Key Interest Rates ...................... 9 US Inflation ............................. 10 QE Taper Tracker ......................... 11 Exchange Rates .......................... 12 US Banking Indicators ...................... 13 US Employment Indicators ................... 14 US Business Activity Indicators ................ 16 US Consumption Indicators .................. 17 US Housing ............................. 18 Global Housing .......................... 20 Global Business Indicators ................... 22 Canadian Indicators ....................... 24 European Indicators ....................... 26 Chinese Indicators ........................ 28 Global Climate Change ..................... 29 Where we are now The Laird Report presents a selection of economic data from around the world to help figure where we are today. It was originally designed to be read on the train - 1 page per minute on my 30 minute morning commute. Formatting Notes The grey bars on the various charts are OECD recession indicators for the respective countries. The current panic seems to be a discussion of the “profit recession” going on in US corporate equities (see page 5). There is definitely a dip off of the recent (2014-2015) highs. Note that a fair chunk of this is actually from the bloodbath in the oil industry as some of the largest companies in the world are in the energy industry. In general, there is no good level or bad level as this measurement is all relative, however I would note that the S&P 500 profit margin is only back to the levels of 2012-2013 levels. By my unscientific method of squinting at the graph, it looks like profits are within the normal error bars for recent activity. More encouraging is the continued strengthening of employment stats. The challenge is that a profit recession is generally believe to foreshadow an actual recession as tight profits usually implies a slow- down in hiring with all the cascading effects that entail (at least in the US). Keep in mind - profits are still very strong, the yield curve (page 9) hasn’t moved, bond spreads are improving, employment is stronger, inflation is inching towards the normal range – what’s not to like? We don’t predict the future here, but the most recent past indi- cates no weakening from an overall macro level. North America looks good right now. Subscription Info For a FREE subscription to this monthly re- port, please visit sign up at our website: www.lairdresearch.com Laird Research, May 16, 2016
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....Laird Research - Economics
May 16, 2016
Where we are now . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
The Laird Report presents a selection of economic data from aroundthe world to help figure where we are today. It was originally designedto be read on the train - 1 page per minute on my 30 minute morningcommute.
Formatting Notes The grey bars on the various charts are OECDrecession indicators for the respective countries.
The current panic seems to be a discussion of the “profit recession”going on in US corporate equities (see page 5). There is definitely adip off of the recent (2014-2015) highs. Note that a fair chunk of this isactually from the bloodbath in the oil industry as some of the largestcompanies in the world are in the energy industry.
In general, there is no good level or bad level as this measurementis all relative, however I would note that the S&P 500 profit margin isonly back to the levels of 2012-2013 levels. By my unscientific methodof squinting at the graph, it looks like profits are within the normal
error bars for recent activity.
More encouraging is the continued strengthening of employmentstats. The challenge is that a profit recession is generally believe toforeshadow an actual recession as tight profits usually implies a slow-down in hiring with all the cascading effects that entail (at least inthe US). Keep in mind - profits are still very strong, the yield curve(page 9) hasn’t moved, bond spreads are improving, employment isstronger, inflation is inching towards the normal range – what’s not tolike? We don’t predict the future here, but the most recent past indi-cates no weakening from an overall macro level. North America looksgood right now.
Subscription Info For a FREE subscription to this monthly re-port, please visit sign up at our website: www.lairdresearch.com
Leading indicators are indicators that usually change before theeconomy as a whole changes. They are useful as short-term predictorsof the economy. Our list includes the Philly Fed’s Leading Index whichsummarizes multiple indicators; initial jobless claims and hours worked(both decrease quickly when demand for employee services drops and
vice versa); purchasing manager indicies; trucking indices showing de-mand for transport; new order and housing permit indicies and con-sumer sentiment (how consumers are feeling about their own financialsituation and the economy in general). Red dots are points where anew trend has started.
Leading indicators are indicators that usually change before theeconomy as a whole changes. They are useful as short-term predictorsof the economy. Our list includes the Philly Fed’s Leading Index whichsummarizes multiple indicators; initial jobless claims and hours worked(both decrease quickly when demand for employee services drops and
vice versa); purchasing manager indicies; trucking indices showing de-mand for transport; new order and housing permit indicies and con-sumer sentiment (how consumers are feeling about their own financialsituation and the economy in general). Red dots are points where anew trend has started.
North AmericaUSA S&P 500 May 13 2,046.6 -0.5% t -1.7% t 8.0% s -2.5% t 1.00 0.73USA NASDAQ Composite May 13 4,717.7 -0.4% t -4.6% t 6.4% s -5.3% t 0.95 0.65USA Wilshire 5000 Total Market May 13 21,117.2 -0.7% t -1.6% t 9.0% s -4.7% t 0.99 0.75Canada S&P TSX May 13 13,748.6 0.3% s 0.6% s 9.5% s -8.2% t 0.73 1.00Europe and RussiaFrance CAC 40 May 13 4,320.0 0.4% s -3.8% t 5.0% s -12.9% t 0.62 0.57Germany DAX May 13 9,952.9 0.8% s -0.7% t 8.1% s -12.3% t 0.56 0.45United Kingdom FTSE May 13 6,138.5 0.2% s -3.5% t 5.4% s -11.7% t 0.64 0.63Russia Market Vectors Russia ETF May 13 17.1 1.2% s -0.8% t 24.0% s -13.7% t 0.67 0.78AsiaTaiwan TSEC weighted index May 13 8,053.7 -1.1% t -6.9% t -0.2% t -17.2% t 0.27 0.25China Shanghai Composite Index May 13 2,827.1 -3.0% t -7.8% t 2.9% s -35.4% t 0.20 0.16Japan NIKKEI 225 May 13 16,412.2 1.9% s 0.2% s 2.4% s -17.0% t 0.08 0.13Hong Kong Hang Seng May 13 19,719.3 -1.9% t -6.8% t 4.2% s -27.6% t 0.30 0.33Korea Kospi May 13 1,967.0 -0.0% t -2.4% t 5.6% s -7.0% t 0.24 0.30South Asia and AustrailiaIndia Bombay Stock Exchange May 13 25,489.6 1.0% s -0.5% t 8.2% s -6.5% t 0.45 0.40Indonesia Jakarta May 13 4,761.7 0.3% s -1.9% t 0.4% s -9.2% t 0.12 0.28Malaysia FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI May 13 1,628.3 -1.3% t -5.5% t -1.3% t -9.7% t 0.31 0.31Australia All Ordinaries May 13 5,396.3 0.7% s 5.2% s 10.3% s -5.5% t 0.13 0.26New Zealand NZX 50 Index Gross May 13 6,916.6 0.3% s 2.0% s 14.6% s 20.3% s 0.06 0.07South AmericaBrasil IBOVESPA May 13 51,804.0 0.2% s -2.5% t 29.2% s -8.1% t 0.50 0.58Argentina MERVAL Buenos Aires May 13 13,121.6 -2.5% t -1.3% t 14.6% s 7.6% s 0.51 0.62Mexico Bolsa index May 13 45,402.5 0.4% s -0.0% t 5.1% s 0.8% s 0.69 0.62MENA and AfricaEgypt Market Vectors Egypt ETF May 13 37.5 -1.8% t -3.4% t 15.5% s -26.3% t 0.44 0.49(Gulf States) Market Vectors Gulf States ETF May 13 22.1 -1.4% t -3.2% t 8.0% s -19.2% t 0.31 0.29South Africa iShares MSCI South Africa Index May 13 48.9 -3.7% t -10.9% t 6.7% s -27.4% t 0.74 0.80(Africa) Market Vectors Africa ETF May 13 19.9 -1.6% t 1.6% s 19.3% s -23.9% t 0.52 0.68CommoditiesUSD Spot Oil West Texas Int. May 09 $43.5 -2.9% t 7.4% s 55.4% s -26.6% t 0.43 0.63USD Gold LME Spot May 13 $1,275.2 -0.4% t 2.4% s 5.5% s 6.9% s -0.08 0.02
Note: Correlations are based on daily arithmetic returns for the most recent 100 trading days.
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 4
S&P 500 Composite Index
The S&P 500 Composite Index is widely regarded as the best singlegauge of the large cap U.S. equities market. A key figure is the valua-tion level of the S&P500 as measured by the Price/Earnings ratio. Wepresent two versions: (1) a 12-month trailing earnings version which
reflects current earnings but is skewed by short term variances and (2)a cyclically adjusted version which looks at the inflation adjusted earn-ings over a 10 year period (i.e. at least one business cycle). Forecastedearnings numbers are estimates provided by S&P.
12−month P/E ( median = 17.4, May = 23.0)10−year CAPE ( median = 19.5, May = 25.6)
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 5
S&P 500 Composite Distributions
This is a view of the price performance of the S&P 500 index com-panies. The area of each box is proportional to the company’s marketcap, while the colour is determined by the percentage change in price
over the past month. In addition, companies are sorted according totheir industry group.
% Change in Price from Apr 1, 2016 to May 13, 2016
Average Median Median MedianSector Change P/Sales P/Book P/EEnergy 6.8% s 1.9 1.9 29.7Materials 1.7% s 1.7 4.4 23.7Health Care 1.3% s 3.4 3.8 27.1Financials 0.5% s 2.8 1.7 17.3Consumer Discretionary -0.8% t 1.7 4.0 19.9
Average Median Median MedianSector Change P/Sales P/Book P/EConsumer Staples -1.0% t 2.4 6.1 27.3Utilities -1.1% t 2.0 1.9 21.4Industrials -1.2% t 1.6 3.7 19.3Telecommunications Services -2.9% t 1.6 1.8 14.0Information Technology -5.4% t 3.5 4.1 24.0
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 6
US Equity Valuations
A key valuation metric is Tobin’s q: the ratio between the marketvalue of the entire US stock market versus US net assets at replacementcost (ie. what you pay versus what you get). Warren Buffet famouslyfollows stock market value as a percentage of GNP, which is highly(93%) correlated to Tobin’s q.
We can also take the reverse approach: assume the market hasvaluations correct, we can determine the required returns of future es-
timated earnings. These are quoted for both debt (using BAA ratedsecurities as a proxy) and equity premiums above the risk free rate (10year US Treasuries). These figures are alternate approaches to under-standing the current market sentiment - higher premiums indicate ademand for greater returns for the same price and show the level ofrisk-aversion in the market.
Tobin's q (Market Equity / Market Net Worth) and S&P500 Price/Sales
10%Implied Equity Premium (median = 4.2%, May = 4.9%)Debt (BAA) Premium (median = 2.0%, May = 2.9%)
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 7
US Mutual Fund Flows
Fund flows describe the net investments in equity and bond mutualfunds in the US market, as described in ICI’s “Trends in Mutual FundInvesting” report. Note however that this is only part of the story as
it does not include ETF fund flows - part of the changes are investorsentering or leaving the market, and part is investors shifting to ETF’sfrom mutual funds.
Interest rates are often leading indicators of stress in the financialsystem. The yield curve show the time structure of interest rates ongovernment bonds - Usually the longer the time the loan is outstanding,the higher the rate charged. However if a recession is expected, thenthe fed cuts rates and this relationship is inverted - leading to negativespreads where short term rates are higher than long term rates.
Almost every recession in the past century has been preceeded by an
inversion - though not every inversion preceeds a recession (just mostof the time).
For corporate bonds, the key issue is the spread between bond rates(i.e. AAA vs BAA bonds) or between government loans (LIBOR vsFedfunds - the infamous “TED Spread”). Here a spike correlates to anaversion to risk, which is an indication that something bad is happen-ing.
US Treasury Yield Curves
For
war
d In
stan
tane
ous
Rat
es (
%)
15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5
0.0
0.5
1.0
1.5
2.0
2.5May 12, 2016 (Today)Apr 12, 2016 (1 mo ago)Feb 12, 2016 (3 mo ago)12 May 2015 (1 yr ago)
Generally, the US Fed tries to anchor long run inflation expectationsto approximately 2%. Inflation can be measured with the ConsumerPrice Index (CPI) or the Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE)index.
In both cases, it makes sense to exclude items that vary quickly likeFood and Energy to get a clearer picture of inflation (usually called
Core Inflation). The Fed seems to think PCI more accurately reflectsthe entire basket of goods and services that households purchase.
Finally, we can make a reasonable estimate of future inflation ex-pectations by comparing real return and normal bonds to construct animputed forward inflation expectation. The 5y5y chart shows expected5 year inflation rates at a point 5 years in the future. Neat trick that.
The US has been using the program of Quantitative Easing to pro-vide monetary stimulous to its economy. The Fed has engaged in aseries of programs (QE1, QE2 & QE3) designed to drive down longterm rates and improve liquidity though purchases of treasuries, mor-gage backed securites and other debt from banks.
The higher demand for long maturity securities would drive up theirprice, but as these securities have a fixed coupon, their yield would bedecreased (yield ≈ coupon / price) thus driving down long term rates.
In 2011-2012, “Operation Twist” attempted to reduce rates withoutincreasing liquidity. They went back to QE in 2013.
The Fed chairman suggested in June 2013 the economy was recover-ing enough that they could start slowing down purchases (“tapering”).The Fed backed off after a brief market panic. The Fed announced inDec 2013 that it was starting the taper, a decision partly driven byseeing key targets of inflation around 2% and unemployment being lessthan 6.5%. In Oct 2014, they announced the end of purchases.
QE Asset Purchases to Date (Treasury & Mortgage Backed Securities)
Trill
ions
0.00.51.01.52.02.5
0.00.51.01.52.02.5
QE1 QE2 Operation Twist QE3 TaperTreasuries
Mortgage Backed Securities
Total Monthly Asset Purchases (Treasury + Mortgage Backed Securities)
Bill
ions
−100−50
050
100150200
−100−50050100150200
Month to date May 11: $0.2
Inflation and Unemployment − Relative to Targets
Per
cent
02468
10
0246810
Target Unemployment 6.5%Target Inflation 2%
U.S. 10 Year and 3 Month Treasury Constant Maturity Yields
Per
cent
012345
012345
2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Short Term Rates:Once at zero, Fed moved to QE
Long Term Rates:Moving up in anticipation of Taper?
The banking and finance industry is a key indicator of the healthof the US economy. It provides crucial liquidity to the economy in theform of credit, and the breakdown of that system is one of the exac-erbating factors of the 2008 recession. Key figures to track are the
Net Interest Margins which determine profitability (ie. the differencebetween what a bank pays to depositors versus what the bank is paidby creditors), along with levels of non-performing loans (i.e. loan lossreserves and actual deliquency rates).
Unemployment rates are considered the “single best indicator ofcurrent labour conditions” by the Fed. The pace of payroll growth ishighly correlated with a number of economic indicators.Payroll changesare another way to track the change in unemployment rate.
Unemployment only captures the percentage of people who are inthe labour market who don’t currently have a job - another measure
is what percentage of the whole population wants a job (employed ornot) - this is the Participation Rate.
The Beveridge Curve measures labour market efficiency by lookingat the relationship between job openings and the unemployment rate.The curve slopes downward reflecting that higher rates of unemploy-ment occur coincidentally with lower levels of job vacancies.
There are a number of other ways to measure the health of employ-ment. The U6 Rate includes people who are part time that want afull-time job - they are employed but under-utilitized. Temporary helpdemand is another indicator of labour market tightness or slack.
The large chart shows changes in private industry employment lev-els over the past year, versus how well those job segments typically pay.Lots of hiring in low paying jobs at the expense of higher paying jobsis generally bad, though perhaps not unsurprising in a recovery.
Housing construction is only about 5-8% of the US economy, how-ever a house is typically the largest asset owned by a household. Sincepersonal consumption is about 70% of the US economy and house val-ues directly impact household wealth, housing is an important indicatorin the health of the overall economy. In particular, housing investment
was an important driver of the economy getting out of the last fewrecessions (though not this one so far). Here we track housing pricesand especially indicators which show the current state of the housingmarket.
15 20 25 30 35
150
200
250
300
Personal Income vs. Housing Prices (Inflation adjusted values)
New
Hom
e P
rice
(000
's)
Disposable Income Per Capita (000's)
Mar 2016
r2 : 89.6%Range: Jan 1959 − Mar 2016Blue dots > +5% change in next yearRed dots < −5% change in next year
The Federal Housing Finance Agency provides a quarterly surveyon house prices, based on sales prices and appraisal data. This gener-ates a housing index for 355 municipal areas in the US from 1979 topresent. We have provided an alternative view of this data looking atthe change in prices from the peak in the 2007 time frame.
The goal is to provide a sense of where the housing markets are
weak versus strong.The colours represent gain or losses since the startof the housing crisis (defined as the maximum price between 2007-2009for each city). The circled dots are the cities in the survey, while thebackground colours are interpolated from these points using a loesssmoother.
Change from 2007 Peak − Q4 2015
−50%
−40%
−30%
−20%
−10%
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
Today's Home Prices
Percentage Change from 2007−2009 Peak
Fre
quen
cy
−75% −50% −25% 0% 25% 50% 75%
Year over Year Change − Q4 2015
−10%
−8%
−6%
−4%
−2%
0%
2%
4%
6%
8%
10%
YoY Change in this quarter
YoY Percent Change
Fre
quen
cy
−15% −10% −5% 0% 5% 10% 15%
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 19
Global Housing
The Bank for International Settlements has begun collecting globalhousing indicies, which are useful for showing what has been happeningwith global house prices. Note that these are not all the same data set -
each country measures housing prices in slightly different ways, so theyare only broadly comparable. Black lines are the data series, blue barson the right axis show the year over year percent change.
Brazil − Metro All Dwellings
Q1
2011
= 1
00
6080
100
140 Jan 2016: 134.69
Chile − All Dwellings
Jun 2015: 127.92
Peru (Lima) − All Dwellings
Dec 2015: 193.62
−40
020
40
Mexico − All Dwellings
Q1
2011
= 1
00
6080
100
140 Dec 2015: 126.60
China (Beijing) − All Dwellings
Dec 2015: 131.55
Hong Kong − Residential Prices
Feb 2016: 165.55
−40
020
40
Indonesia − Major Cities housing
Q1
2011
= 1
00
02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
6080
100
140 Dec 2015: 135.71
India − Major Cities housing
02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Sep 2015: 205.91
Singapore − All Dwellings
02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Sep 2015: 100.00
−40
020
40
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 20
Philippines (Manila) − FlatsQ
1 20
11 =
100
6080
120
Dec 2015: 146.25
Japan − All Dwellings
Dec 2015: 104.60
Australia − All Dwellings
Sep 2015: 126.97
−40
020
40
New Zealand − All Dwellings Big Cities
Q1
2011
= 1
00
6080
120
Sep 2015: 153.58
Turkey − All Dwellings
Jan 2016: 194.00
South Africa − Residential
Mar 2016: 119.91
−40
020
40
Israel − All Dwellings
Q1
2011
= 1
00
6080
120
Dec 2015: 134.75
Korea − All Dwellings
Mar 2016: 113.99
Russia − All Dwellings (Urban)
Sep 2015: 123.98
−40
020
40
Euro zone − All Dwellings
Q1
2011
= 1
00
02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
6080
120
Dec 2015: 99.40
Canada − New Houses
02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Feb 2016: 109.79
US − New Single Family Houses
02 03 04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
Dec 2015: 123.48
−40
020
40
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 21
Global Business Indicators
Global Manufacturing PMI Reports
The Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) is an indicator reflectingpurchasing managers’ acquisition of goods and services. An index read-ing of 50.0 means that business conditions are unchanged, a numberover 50.0 indicates an improvement while anything below 50.0 suggests
a decline. The further away from 50.0 the index is, the stronger thechange over the month. The chart at the bottom shows a moving av-erage of a number of PMI’s, along with standard deviation bands toshow a global average.
Purchase Managers Index (Manufacturing) − China, Japan, USA, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, UK, Australia
04 05 06 07 08 09 10 11 12 13 14 15 16
3040
5060
70
3040
5060
70
Business Conditions Contracting
Business Conditions Expanding
www.lairdresearch.com May 16, 2016 Page 22
Global Manufacturing PMI Chart
This is an alternate view of the global PMI reports. Here, we lookat all the various PMI data series in a single chart and watch theirevolution over time.
Red numbers indicate contraction (as estimated by PMI) whilegreen numbers indicate expansion.
Series Dates Apr 2016 Apr 2016 Apr 2016 Mar 2016 Mar 2016 Mar 2016 Apr 2016 Apr 2016� France -11.2 t 10.0 t 0.51 u 111.2 t 105.5 s -0.1 u -9.2 s 48.0 t� Germany -3.5 s 4.2 t 0.13 t NA 113.6 t 0.1 s -13.4 t 51.8 s� United Kingdom -1.9 t 5.0 u 1.48 s 112.1 t NA 0.5 -10.8 s 49.2 t� Italy 0.1 s 11.4 t 1.44 s 100.2 t NA -0.2 u -14.3 t 53.9 s� Greece -4.0 s 24.4 s 9.03 t NA NA -0.7 t -24.6 s 49.7 s� Spain 3.4 t 20.4 t 1.53 t NA NA -1.0 u -4.8 s 53.5 s� Eurozone (EU28) -2.6 t 8.8 t 1.20 s 107.5 t 109.4 t 0.0 -13.1 s NA
Tracking the Chinese economy is a tricky. As reported in the Fi-nancial Times, Premier Li Keqiang confided to US officials in 2007 thatgross domestic product was “man made” and “for reference only”. In-stead, he suggested that it was much more useful to focus on three alter-native indicators: electricity consumption, rail cargo volumes and bank
lending (still tracking down that last one). We also include the PMI- which is an official version put out by the Chinese government anddiffers slightly from an HSBC version. Finally we include the ShanghaiComposite Index as a measure of stock performance.
Temperature and precipitation data are taken from the US NationalClimatic Data Center and presented as the average monthly anomalyfrom the previous 6 months. Anomalies are defined as the difference
from the average value over the period from 1971-2000 for the tem-perature map and over the 20th century for the global temparaturechart.
Average Temperature Anomalies from Oct 2015 - Mar 2016
<−4.0 −3.0 −2.0 −1.0 0.0 1.0 2.0 3.0 >4.0Anomalies in Celcius WarmerCooler Anomalies in Celcius