Economic Market Update

* By Jason Schenker * The first half of the 2018 included a number of policy surprises that engendered significant financial market volatility. U.S. trade policy, in particular, became a flashpoint of uncertainty, as tariffs were lobbed back and forth between the U.S. and China. The aftermath of that uncertainty is likely to cast a shadow over growth prospects late ...

The outlook for the U.S. economy, global economy and material handling is strong for 2018. By Jason Schenker— Leading economic activity data, low interest rates, favorable tax policies in the United States, a falling greenback, and solid equity markets were all positive dynamics coming together to push material handling orders and overall activity to strong levels at the start of ...

2018 Economic Outlook: Growth Expectations and Policy Risks By Jason Schenker, CMT®, CFP®, ERP®, CVA®, Prestige Economics, LLC— There are many reasons to be optimistic about growth in the year ahead. Data in the latter half of 2017 were generally positive, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) raised its global growth forecasts, and leading indicators—like global purchasing manager indices—were indicative of ...

U.S. and Global Outlook Remain Positive for Material Handling and the Overall Economy By Jason Schenker, CMT, CFP, ERP, CVA, Prestige Economics, LLC The outlook for material handling remains positive, as long as the outlook for the U.S. economy remains positive. In a recent analysis, we found that nominal U.S. GDP is over 90 percent correlated with material handling. This ...

Optimism about the U.S. economic outlook that increased at the end of 2016, strengthened even further in the first quarter of 2017. U.S. consumer confidence rose sharply in the first quarter and data from the ISM Manufacturing and Non-Manufacturing purchasing manager indices (PMIs) and the MHI Business Activity Index (BAI) was positive. Although there had been downside risks to U.S. ...

Optimism about the U.S. economic outlook increased at the end of 2016, after the U.S. presidential election. Expectations of Reaganesque corporate and individual tax cuts that would be accompanied by FDR-era infrastructure spending sent equities higher—and improved the potential for investment. While optimism about U.S. growth improved at the end of 2016 and the beginning of 2017, global growth expectations ...

Slow global growth, Brexit fallout, oil and gas credit risks and U.S. election fallout continue to present risks for the year ahead. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) reported global growth at 3.1 percent for 2015, with expected growth of 3.1 percent for 2016. On the upside, in October 2016, the IMF presented its forecast for 2017 global growth at 3.4 ...

Hold on to your hats, because 2017 is likely to be a bumpy ride because of slowing global growth, Brexit fallout, oil and gas credit risks and election cyclicality! Lower global growth expectations Back in July, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) lowered its global 2016 and 2017 growth forecasts in response to Brexit concerns, which also sent the dollar higher ...

There have been three red f lags highlighting downside risks to growth and the U.S. economy for the better part of a year: manufacturing, energy and finance. These red flags were the impetus behind my recent book, Recession-Proof: How to Survive and Thrive in an Economic Downturn. Interestingly, these were also three of the main down­side risks to the global ...

The outlook for U.S. economic growth and material handling for 2016 and 2017 has softened sharply in recent quarters. U.S. manufacturing activity fell to recession levels when it began contracting at the end of 2015, which can be seen in the yearover- year rate of industrial production and the ISM Manufacturing Index (see graph on page 110). Although U.S. manufacturing ...