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Lighthouse Investment Management
Macro Report - US economic indicators - April 2013 Page 1
Macro Report Economic Indicators - USA - April 2013
Contents
Summary ....................................................................................................................................................... 2
Lighthouse Recession Probability Index........................................................................................................ 3
Introduction .................................................................................................................................................. 4
Fed Funds Rate .............................................................................................................................................. 8
Crude Oil ....................................................................................................................................................... 9
Construction: Building permits ................................................................................................................... 10
Employment: Non-Farm Payrolls ................................................................................................................ 11
Employment: Jobs Gained / Lost ................................................................................................................ 12
Employment: Jobs Gained/Lost (zoomed-in) .............................................................................................. 13
Employment: Hire and Fire ......................................................................................................................... 14Employment: Initial and Revised Non-Farm Payrolls .................................................................................. 15
Employment: Full Time ............................................................................................................................... 16
Employment: Part Time .............................................................................................................................. 17
Employment: Full-Time to Part-Time Ratio ................................................................................................ 18
Consumer Sentiment: University of Michigan Survey ................................................................................ 19
Consumer Confidence: Conference Board Survey ...................................................................................... 20
Total Credit Outstanding ............................................................................................................................. 21
Electricity Usage .......................................................................................................................................... 22
Retail Sales: Nominal .................................................................................................................................. 23
Retail Sales: Real ......................................................................................................................................... 24
Retail Sales: Real per-capita ........................................................................................................................ 25
Manufacturing: Hours Worked ................................................................................................................... 26
Manufacturing: Orders ............................................................................................................................... 27
Transportation: Miles Traveled ................................................................................................................... 28
Orders: Capital Goods ................................................................................................................................. 29
Output: Electricity and Gas ......................................................................................................................... 30
Manufacturing: Supplier Deliveries ............................................................................................................ 31
Transportation: Gasoline Consumption ...................................................................................................... 32
Inflation: Implicit Price Deflator .................................................................................................................. 33
Inflation: Consumer Price Index .................................................................................................................. 34
Inflation Expectations ................................................................................................................................. 35
Inflation Expectations and Stock Market .................................................................................................... 36
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Summary
Improvements in this report:
• More granularity on employment trends (hiring and separations, full-time and part-time)
• Retail sales (now including real and real per-capita sales)
• Inflation (PCE-derived inflation, inflation and stock market correlation)
March 2013 highlights:
• The likelihood of recession declined slightly to 5% from remained a revised 10% in the previous
month
• Output by electric and gas utilities, industrial electricity consumption and miles traveled are the
only variables showing recessionary tendencies
• Retail sales growth continues to slow
• Average monthly employment increased slightly from 169k to 173k per month.
April 2013 trends:
• Slightly lower UoM Consumer Sentiment contrasted higher CB Consumer Confidence
• Slight decrease in average weekly hours
• ISM manufacturing new orders and deliveries hover slightly above 50
• PCE-derived inflation fell to 1.2% in Q1 2013, the lowest since Q3 2009, and below the Fed's
target range of 2% +/- 0.5%
CONCLUSION:
• Based on our set of 13 weighted indicators the probability for US recession remains low.
• However, economic growth remains very weak
• The Federal Reserve will not be able to reduce 'quantitative easing' under these circumstances
• Should disinflationary trends continue, the Fed will have no other choice than to increase the
pace of printing money
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Lighthouse Recession Probability Index
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Introduction
Recessions are bad for company profits and hence stock prices. Knowing when an economic slow-down
looms can give important clues about asset class selection.
In the US, the beginning and the end points of recessions are declared by the NBER (National Bureau of
Economic Research). The NBER defines recessions as a "significant decline in economic activity spread
across the economy" (not, as often believed, as two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth).
The NBER takes it's time to date the beginning and the end of a down-turn; it announced the beginning
of the last recession (December 2007) only on December 1, 2008 - one year later. By that time, the S&P
500 Index had fallen from 1,575 points to 741. Similarly, the end of the recession in June 2009 was
announced on September 20, 2010 - more than one year later. By that time, the S&P 500 had already
soared from 940 points to 1,142.
Waiting for the NBER to declare beginning and end of recessions would have led to inferior investment
results (the NBER is correct in taking it's time, since many economic indicators are being revised multiple
times as preliminary data gets updated).
Traditional leading indicators include values such as the stock market and the slope of the yield curve.
However, the stock market does not seem very good at anticipating recessions, as the S&P 500 index
marked an all-time high in mid-October 2007, a mere six weeks before the most severe recession of the
last 8 decades began.
The yield curve has historically been a very good warning sign of recessions, as the Federal Reserve Bankwas forced to increase short-term rates in order to cool an overheating economy (thereby triggering a
recession). However, with short-term interest rates near zero for the foreseeable future, the yield curve
could only invert if long-term yields dipped into negative territory. While not entirely impossible
(negative yields for up to 2 year maturities have been observed in German, Swiss, Danish and other
government bond markets) it is very unlikely to happen in US Treasuries. Therefore, the slope of the US
yield curve is unlikely to give any hints about a recession occurring under ZIRP (zero-interest-rate-
policy).
Indicators published by other institutions, such as ECRI (Economic Cycle Research Institute), are
proprietary and not transparent, giving investors only the choice to "believe-it-or-leave-it".
The Conference Board Leading Indicator includes questionable values such as the S&P 500 Index, the
slope of the US yield curve and M2 money supply (which we have found to have little correlation with
economic cycles).
As most recessions last rarely longer than a year, the economy usually had already exited a recession by
the time the NBER declared it to be in one.
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Revisions to GDP growth render it useless for investment purposes; On August 28, 2008 (already 8
months into the "great recession"), Q2 2008 GDP growth was revised upwards from an initial +1.9% to
+3.3%, triggering a 2% stock market rally. Later, growth was revised down to 1.3%, with the following
quarters delivering -3.7%, -9.2% and -5.4% (quarter-on-quarter, annualized). The S&P 500 Index didn't
regain the level attained that day for another 2 1/2 years.
Finding a reliable indicator for identifying recessions "real-time" would already be a great improvement
over waiting for the NBER.
Over the past 50 years, every recession was easily explained by two factors: oil and the Fed.
Unfortunately, this does not have to be the case going forward. Due to impotence of monetary policy at
the lower zero bound and rapidly increasing government debt the Fed might not be able to raise rates in
the foreseeable future. A recession might hence happen without prior tightening by the Fed.
We looked at many indicators from every angle; most had to be smoothed to cancel out short-term
"noise" in order to prevent false signals (we use 3-months moving averages).
Some indicators do not reveal useful signals unless you look at decline from recent peaks. Other data
needs to be trend adjusted (number of miles driven, for example, benefits from rising number of cars
and population).
The table on the following page shows indicators we have tested. Our criteria:
• false positives (calling for a recession when there was none)• false negatives (missed a recession)
• confidence it will work in the future and
• lead / lag time
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No two recessions are the same. Trigger levels can be too strict (missing some recessions) or too lose
(giving too many false positives). We therefore created a range. The lower ("strict") boundary is the level
necessary to avoid false positives; the upper ("lenient") boundary is the level necessary to catch all
recessions. A high-quality indicator will have a narrow range, and recessions will be called with high
confidence. An indicator at the upper boundary will be awarded a 50% probability, increasing towards
100% at the lower boundary.
The overall "LighthouseRecession Probability
Indicator" (LRPI) is a
weighted mean of individual
indicators. High confidence
and timeliness of signal
have been awarded higher
weights (maximum: 3) then
those with low confidence
or tardiness (minimum: 1).
On the following page yousee the LRPI since 1971,
predicting every recession
(assumed once 40%-50%
probability is exceeded).
The Federal Reserve Bank of
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St. Louis publishes a recession probability indicator by Chauvet / Piger (black line). It is based on four
inputs (non-farm payrolls, industrial production, real personal income and real manufacturing and trade
sales). However, the most recent data point for Chauvet/Piger is usually three months old, while LRPI is
constantly updated (1 months old data).
You can see that LRPI shows first warnings signs much earlier than Chauvet/Piger.
In a recent response to a blog post, Chauvet clarified their indicator calls for a recession only "after
exceeding 80% for a couple of months". Additionally, their indicator is "smoothed" as the raw data can
reach 70% (2003/4) without being followed by a recession. Their indicator initially showed a recession
probability of 20% for August 2012, only to be revised down to 1.7% six months later.
Verification of LRPI:
We set 40% as threshold for the LRPI to indicate a buy (recession probability <40%) or sell (>40%) signal.
Transactions have been done at the monthly closing price of the S&P 500 following the month for which
the signal occurred (in order to accommodate time lag):
An investor using the LRPI as a trading tool would have suffered only one loss of 7% (August 1980) while
avoiding the dot-com crash (2001) and the 'great recession' (2008-2009). The system creates no
unnecessary churn. While the control group ('buy-and-hold') would have created a higher return (with
higher volatility) this might be due to the test period coinciding with one of the longest bull markets inhistory (1982-2000).
Annex: LRPI Components
Please find charts for all contributors to the LRPI on the following pages.
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Fed Funds Rate
The US central bank ("Fed") increased interest rates ahead of each of the last 9 recessions. The black line
shows the absolute level of the Fed Funds rate; the blue line the increase from the prior post-recession
low. An increase between 2 and 4.5 percentage points from the previous low preceded every recession
since 1954.
Recessions are shaded in gray. Yellow dots indicate the beginning of a recession; green dots the end.
The absolute level (black line) is usually on the right-hand scale, while percentage changes (blue line) are
on the left-hand scale. Negative absolute numbers should be ignored as they are merely needed for
better formatting.
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Crude Oil
• An increase in the price of crude oil of 75% to 100% preceded five out of the last six recessions.
• Close call in March 2011 and February 2012.
• Currently not a red flag.
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Construction: Building permits
Want to build a house? Need a permit! Any decline in permits of 25%+ from prior peak and you can bet
on a recession. Missed the one in 2001 though. 2011 was a close call. Absolute level still below 1990/91
recession lows (despite US population growth from 250m then to 315m in 2012).
Due to housing overhang unlikely to give a boost to the economy. Due to low level unlikely to do much
damage to GDP either (should permits decline again).
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Employment: Non-Farm Payrolls
The number of people on "payroll", or employed, is a good proxy for the health of the economy. You can
see the long "valleys" of lost payrolls after recent recessions compared to earlier ones. A decline of more
than 1% from previous peak payroll level indicates a recession. There have been no misses and no false
positives; even the "tricky" back-to-back recessions in 1980 and 1982 have been called correctly by this
indicator.
However, not all jobs are equal; only 47% of all working-age Americans have full-time jobs. Since 2007,
six million full-time jobs have been lost, but 2.5 million part-time jobs gained. Part-time jobs often come
without "benefits" such as health insurance. From peak employment (Q1 2008) to Q1 2010 1.2 million"higher-" wage jobs (median hourly wage $21-54) have been lost; in the subsequent 2 years only 0.8
million have been recreated. While almost 4 million mid-wage jobs ($14-21) have been lost, only 0.9m
have reappeared. Among lower wage jobs ($7-$14), 1.3 million have been lost, but 2 million gained.
Current monthly payroll growth of 173,000 (12 months average) indicates zero probability of recession.
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Employment: Jobs Gained / Lost
Current monthly payroll growth of 173,000 (12 months average) indicates zero probability of recession.
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Employment: Jobs Gained/Lost (zoomed-in)
• April payroll data was better (+165,000) than expected (+153,000)
• However, it should be noted that the margin of error is around 100,000, and revisions can be up
to 300,000
• More important than the April number were revisions for earlier months; February from an
initial 236,000 to 332,000, and March from 88,000 to 138,000.
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Employment: Hire and Fire
• Each month, more than 4 million people are newly employed and more than 4 million people
quit their job or are fired.
• These are big numbers compared to the balance between those two (the monthly change in
non-farm payrolls).
• The difference between those two lines are the net changes in employment (lower chart).
• You will notice less separations (fewer employees resign) during the 'great recession';
unemployment rose simply because new hires fell even faster.
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Employment: Initial and Revised Non-Farm Payrolls
• This chart shows monthly changes in employment as initially reported (black dotted line), the
revised number (thick black line) and the difference between the two (green/red chart, right hand
scale).
• During the last recession (we didn’t know we were in one yet), monthly employment numbers were
revised downwards by up to 273,000.
• In Q3 2008, revisions were -159k, -190k and -273k (that’s before Lehman happened).
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Employment: Full Time
• The overall employment picture may be misleading, as it is usually higher paying full-time jobs
being culled in a recession.
• Full-time employment growth (year-over-year) has recently slowed down to 1.4%, an area which
historically was often associated with recessions.
• Part-time jobs often come without healthcare benefits, forcing the employee to cover his own
medical expenses (leaving less money for consumption).
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Employment: Part Time
• During each recession, the number of part-time employees spikes up
• Companies, uncertain regarding the economic outlook, prefer not to enter longer-term
commitments
• A part-time job may be better than no job, but usually does not sustain the costs of living of a
family.
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Employment: Full-Time to Part-Time Ratio
• The number of full-time employees used to be more than five times the number of part-time
employees
• In each recession, full-time employees are replaced by part-timers
• The ratio has not recovered in a meaningful way since the 'great recession'
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Consumer Sentiment: University of Michigan Survey
• The University of Michigan, together with Thompson-Reuters, conducts more than 500
telephone interviews twice a month to gauge consumer sentiment, with a reference point from
1964 set to 100. A preliminary mid-month survey is followed up by a final one towards the end
of the month.
• The indicator had one false positive (2005) and one miss (1981; the 1980-1981 recessions were
back-to-back, so let's not be too harsh about that).
• A decline of 25%+ from previous peak indicates a recession.
• 2011 was a close call.
• The final reading for the month (76.4) came in higher than the preliminary number (72.3).
• This indicator currently does not deliver a warning sign.
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Consumer Confidence: Conference Board Survey
• The Conference Board, an independent business membership and research association,
conducts a survey of consumer confidence by mailing out surveys to more than 3,000 randomly
selected households. The cut-off date for a preliminary number is the 18th of the months. The
final number includes all surveys returned after that date.
• The indicator had two false positives (1992, 2003), but it did catch all recessions including the
ones in 1981/2 and 2001 (difficult for a lot of other indicators).
• 2011 was a "close call".
• This indicator's initial reading for the month (68.1) showed an improvement from the prior
month (61.9).
• No red flag currently.
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Total Credit Outstanding
Most recessions have been accompanied by a reduction in the growth of debt. But, for the first time in
60 years, debt has actually shrunk in 2009. A meager 2% reduction caused a massive recession. The
classic question of chicken and egg comes to mind: did the recession cause debt to shrink or did
shrinking debt induce a recession?
I have included the 1987 stock market crash (red triangle). A dramatic revelation dawns: economic
growth is dependent on credit (debt) growth; without additional debt, growth is impossible.
Unfortunately, data becomes available only once every quarter, with the latest data often many monthsold. To ensure timeliness for our LRPI we had to exclude this measure, however present it here for
informational purposes.
In Q4 2012, TCMDO was growing at a $2.9 trillion rate over the last 8 quarters (versus revised 2.7 trillion
in Q3)). TCMDO-to-GDP has increased to 355% (Q3: 352%, Q2: 354%, previous peak was 385% in Q1'09).
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Electricity Usage
• If you run a business you need electricity
• Weather can have an impact as electricity use in the US peaks in summer due to air conditioning
• If electricity usage drops by 1% or more, it's a recession
• Limited historic data, but no misses and no false positives.
• Currently indicating a 50% likelihood of recession.
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Retail Sales: Nominal
• After a three consecutive months of decline (April May, June 2012), US retail sales (excluding
food services) have resumed their previous growth trend.
• However, the rate of growth has continued to decline, and has entered the red zone indicating
an increasing probability of a recession.
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Retail Sales: Real
• Real retail sales (volumes) have only recently reached their pre-recession level
• The rate of growth continues to slow down
• No recession signal currently
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Retail Sales: Real per-capita
• Real per-capita retails sales are still 5% below their pre-recession peak
• The rate of growth continues to slow down (1.3%)
• No recession signal (yet)
• The rate of change in nominal retail sales excluding autos has reached 100% recession
probability. Auto sales continue to benefit from very low interest rates, abundant credit and
deep-subprime used-car loans.
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Manufacturing: Hours Worked
• Companies prefer to reduce employee's working hours rather than firing them straight away
• A drop in average weekly working hours in the manufacturing sector of 2% or more indicates a
recession (except for 1996)
• According to this indicator, the US economy is still sailing smoothly
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Manufacturing: Orders
• The Institute for Supply Management (ISM) regularly asks company executives about orders,
sales, inventories etc.
• A level of 50 indicates "unchanged" (economy stagnates).
• This indicator delivered one false positive (1989).
• The ISM new orders index improved slightly in March (52.3 versus 51.4) after briefly dipping into
dangerous territory (December 2012).
• Currently no warning sign.
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Transportation: Miles Traveled
The US population increases approximately 1% per annum, so traffic increases constantly. If total miles
driven grow less than 0.1% versus its own trend, you are likely to be in a recession (the unemployed
drive less).
The 2001 recession was missed. This indicator says we had a recession in 2011 (which is theoretically
possible - we might not know it yet). The prolonged decline in miles traveled since 2007 is puzzling; the
decline being deeper than the back-to-back recession 1980/81. Online shopping, car pooling and work-
from-home jobs might have contributed to this trend.
Unfortunately, the data is made available only with a time lag of three months. This, combined with
lower confidence, made us exclude this indicator from the LRPI. In March, historic data has been revised
going back for years, denting confidence in this indicator further.
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Orders: Capital Goods
Defense and aircraft orders are lumpy and distort trends, so we exclude them here. We have "medium"
confidence in this indicator due to limited historic data. The "red zone" has been set at -8% to 0%.
February non-defense durable goods ex-aircraft orders were revised downwards by $1.4bn. March came
in at $64.5bn, up slightly from a revised $64.3bn in February - the highest since 53 months (for which I
have no good explanation).
However, defense and aircraft orders are more than twice as much as the rest. Any cuts in defense
spending and problems with Boeing's 787 model affect total orders, with repercussions for manysuppliers. So I wouldn't get too excited about the non-defense ex-aircraft data.
• This indicator currently gives a 50% probability of recession
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Output: Electricity and Gas
• Electricity production should be linked to economic growth.
• This indicator, unfortunately, had many false positives (1983, 1992, 1997, 2006), so confidence
is "medium".
• Setting the trigger lower than -0.5% would eliminate false positives, but make you also miss
some recessions.
• Recent data has seen quite some revisions of up to 2.5% magnitude.
• Electricity production suggests we are in a recession with around 70% likelihood.
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Manufacturing: Supplier Deliveries
• Multiple false positives (1985, 1989, 1995, 1998, 2005) muddy the water.
• Therefore, this indicator has been slapped with "low" confidence and a corresponding
weighting.
• Recent surveys hovered around the 50-point mark.
• The current reading suggests a slight growth in manufacturing supplier deliveries.
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Transportation: Gasoline Consumption
• Cars need gas, and gas needs to be delivered to gas stations.
• Inventory effects are unlikely because of high turnover.
• "Low" confidence because of false positive (1996) and limited historic data.
• The harsh decline in 2012 is puzzling, but recovered since March 2012.
• This indicator is currently giving a 55% likelihood of recession.
This indicator is related to "miles driven", confirming trends on one hand, but being redundant on the
other. It has therefore been excluded from LRPI.
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Inflation: Implicit Price Deflator
• The implicit price deflator is derived from the quarterly GDP report by comparing the current-
dollar value of personal consumption expenditures (PCE) to its chained-value series
• The Federal Reserve prefers this variable over the official consumer price index (CPI)
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Inflation: Consumer Price Index
• Headline CPI-U ("consumer price index for urban consumers") is currently rising at a seasonally
adjusted rate of 1.5% (previously: 2.0%).
• Core CPI-U (excluding effects from food and energy prices) is currently rising at a seasonally
adjusted rate of 1.9% (previously 2.0%) .
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Inflation Expectations
• Real yield = nominal yield minus inflation
• You can resolve the formula for [inflation = nominal yield minus real yield]
• We use Treasury bonds for nominal yields, and TIPS (Treasury Inflation Protected Securities) for
real yield.
• The break-even rate of inflation is the rate at which it does not matter if you bought Treasury
bonds or TIPS (return would be the same).
• The resulting implied inflation rates for over the next 5 (red), 10 (blue) and 30 (black) years are
printed in above chart.
• If you know the average rate over 10 years, and for the first 5 years of those 10 years, you can
derive the expected rate of inflation for years 6 to 10 (green).• The "expected" rate of inflation is not a forecast; it may or may not come true. Market
expectations change.
• Changes in the expected rate of inflation are of interest due to a high correlation (over 75% until
mid-February 2012) to changes in the S&P 500 Index (see next page).
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Lighthouse Investment Management
Macro Report - US economic indicators - April 2013 Page 36
Inflation Expectations and Stock Market
• The current data point (red) is the farthest away from the regression line since the beginning of
2012
• Assuming historic correlations remain valid, either the stock market is over-extended or inflation
expectations would have to catch up substantially.
• The expected value for the S&P 500 given current inflation expectations is around 1,400
(currently 1633).
Any questions or feedback highly welcome.
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Lighthouse Investment Management
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