Employment

Another Happy-Go-Lucky Day

Jun 3, 2025 3 min read paid

Ed Yardeni

Mixed Signals

Jun 2, 2025 3 min read

So is the economy slowing or speeding up? Yes, it is doing both according to today's batch of economic indicators. No wonder that neither stocks nor bonds did much today. The calm in the stock market was notable given that President Donald Trump was Tariff Man again on Friday, blasting China for not abiding by the temporary and partial tariff truce with the US and doubling the tariff

Ed Yardeni

ECONOMIC WEEK AHEAD: June 2 - 6

Jun 1, 2025 3 min read

There's no question that President Donald Trump is stress testing the resilience of the economy with what we've been (objectively) calling Trump's Tariff Turmoil (TTT). The latest developments on Friday: Trump declared that China is violating terms agreed upon in its trade deal with the US, and he raised the tariff on aluminum and steel from 25% to 50%. Nevertheless, the resilience of the

Ed Yardeni
William Pesek

ECONOMIC WEEK AHEAD: May 27 - 30

May 26, 2025 3 min read paid

The week ahead is starting with another tariff whiplash. On April 2, President Donald Trump imposed hefty reciprocal tariffs on America's trading partners but postponed them for 90 days on April 9. On Friday, he threatened new tariffs on the European Union, Apple Inc., and perhaps Samsung and other tech giants to be named later. But on Sunday, he postponed Friday's June 1 tariff of 50%

Ed Yardeni
William Pesek

The Elephants In The Room

May 22, 2025 3 min read

The elephant is as good a metaphor as there is for the US government bond market. Its scale, power, memory, emotional intelligence, and tendency to live in complex family groups—just like the broad array of debt instruments—are right on the nose . . . er, trunk. Yet this week, we saw that the room in which the bond market operates has more than one elephant. The other large mammal in question

Ed Yardeni
William Pesek

ECONOMIC WEEK AHEAD: May 19–23

May 18, 2025 3 min read

The week ahead is light on economic indicators. Fed officials undoubtedly will make some headlines. They are likely to reiterate Fed Chair Jerome Powell's basic message during his May 7 presser: "We may find ourselves in the challenging scenario in which our dual-mandate goals are in tension. If that were to occur, we would consider how far the economy is from each goal, and the potentially different

Ed Yardeni
William Pesek

Not Much Stagflation Today

May 15, 2025 4 min read

Earlier this year, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said that he and President Donald Trump were focusing on the 10-year Treasury bond yield as a key metric for economic health, rather than the Fed's short-term interest rate. He stated, "He and I are focused on the 10-year Treasury," indicating a strategy to manage borrowing costs through fiscal policy rather than pressuring the Fed to cut rates.

Ed Yardeni
William Pesek

ECONOMIC WEEK AHEAD: April 28–May 2

Apr 27, 2025 3 min read paid

The week ahead is jampacked with economic updates. The headliners will be Q1's GDP and March's personal income and expenditures (both Wed) as well as April's payroll employment (Fri). We're expecting relatively strong employment data, which should highlight the US economy's resilience notwithstanding Trump's Tariff Turmoil (TTT). The week's inflation indicators likely remained subdued, although tariff-related

Ed Yardeni

LIBERATION WEEK: March 31-April 4

Mar 30, 2025 3 min read paid

Trump's Reign of Tariffs will likely dominate the economic week ahead. The big event will occur on April 2 (dubbed "Liberation Day" by President Donald Trump). That's when the administration will impose reciprocal tariffs on a number of America's trading partners. However, it's very likely that tariff announcements will continue after that date, as bilateral negotiations are teased out and

Ed Yardeni

Layoffs Rising According To Challenger Report. Is That Alarming?

Mar 6, 2025 2 min read paid

We raised the odds of a recession on March 4 from 20% to 35%. Today's Challenger Report showed an alarming jump in February's announced job layoffs to 172,017, the highest since July 2020 (chart). On the other hand, initial unemployment claims remained low through the February 28 week. So we aren't raising our odds of a recession again, for now. A third of

Ed Yardeni

ECONOMIC WEEK: March 3–7

Mar 2, 2025 3 min read

February's batch of economic indicators for January was mostly downbeat, the sort of numbers suggestive of a severe economic slowdown. They caused a few economists to raise their odds of a recession but not us. Indeed, the Citigroup Economic Surprise Index fell to -16.5, the weakest since the summer of 2024 (chart). The 10-year Treasury bond yield fell to 4.24% on Friday from a peak of

Ed Yardeni

Economic Growth Seems To Be Picking Up

Feb 10, 2025 3 min read paid

Bearish stock market narratives have been pervasive since early 2022. They are becoming more so now with each headline coming out of Washington. Duties, deportations, duties, and de-bureaucratization (the four "Ds") can have a shock-and-awe effect. But financial markets broadly have been unperturbed because the US economy continues to be rock solid. Then again, reining in the budget deficit and trade deficit is no easy task. President Donald

Ed Yardeni

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