Econintersect LLC

When I lived in the corporate world, we used global and domestic transport to forecast the economy. The reason was that transport led economic activity.Follow up: Rail is a particularly useful crystal...

This past week, the market was treated by relatively good industrial production data from the Federal Reserve. Headline seasonally adjusted Industrial Production (IP) increased 0.7 % month-over-month...

Pundits are all over the map on the future direction of the economy. Many are simply optimists (or pessimists) regurgitating baseless and emotional views. But even those with a good understanding of...

Recently there has been a proliferation of articles attributing the decline of GDP to weak productivity growth. Cause and effect, or more crap from pundits?Follow up: The concern of the productivity...

Looking back, the Federal Reserve believed the decline in oil prices was good for the economy - and would provide a stimulus as consumers could spend the money saved on lower oil prices on other...

I have no love for opinion masquerading as economic fact. Opinion is when there is little or no data in support of a conclusion. All too often, any economic "data" used is cherry picked (ignoring data...

Whenever I think that consumer credit growth must be nearing the tipping point, the next month consumer credit grows again. After all, logic dictates the more debt grows the harder it becomes to repay...

I wish I had the answer to correct the wealth imbalance between the average Joe and the ultra-rich. Personally I see no evidence that taxing the crap out of the rich to gift the poor will do anything...

There is truth in the old adage that many cannot see the forest for the trees. I have seen financiers and engineers faced with a problem, pull out a calculator, and puke out analysis with solutions...

Once a month, I assemble an economic forecast based on analysis of various data points which have led the economy. Historically, most of the time the economy trends up or trends down - but recently...

Too often I disagree with the RESULTS of the methodology used to analyze data releases. There is no methodology which is perfect - and for this reason I believe the less you screw with the raw data -...

I can "prove", using sources on the internet, almost anything. Gold going up, gold declining. Market momentum increasing, market crashing. Even studies and research conflicts, and much of it out of...

Sometimes we all get stuck in a rut - and my rut has been the Federal Reserve's decision to raise the federal funds rate in December - and their continuing publicity to support why this action was...

Throughout my career, I have been faced with the dumbest smart people. Many times the deeper one looks at something - the more complex the analysis - the obvious is missed.Follow up: On 16 December...

I read tea leaves which are constantly in motion. It not hard for me to paint a doom-and-gloom picture one week, and the next week say that everything is coming up roses. I do not fall in love with...

Last week the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) re-estimated their historical employment growth. This allows an analysis of the monthly job growth estimates by the BLS and ADP - as well as the...