SF FedViews

As the Greek debt crisis intensified and panic began spreading to other parts of the European periphery, the European Union (EU), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the European Central Bank (ECB) took aggressive steps to provide support for Greece and to protect against contagion to other countries. These actions included $140 billion of loans […]

It is interesting to examine the recession and recovery of the economy through the prism of the stock market—particularly the broad Standard & Poor’s (S&P) 500-stock index, and the narrower S&P Homebuilders Industry and Dow Jones financial institution indexes. The first stage in the economic downturn was a housing bust, which was evident in steep […]

The economy has shown more signs that it is on the rebound, with the recovery proceeding at a moderate pace. GDP growth for the fourth quarter of 2009 was revised up to 5.9 percent from 5.7 percent. However, 3.9 percentage points, about two-thirds of that number, was due to inventory investment as firms sharply slowed […]

The economy appears to be in a moderate recovery, but questions remain about the durability of growth and whether it can be sustained by private demand as the impetus from the federal fiscal stimulus fades later this year. While the recession may be over, production, income, sales, and employment are at very low levels. With […]

Looking at the outlook from a year ago, our forecasts for economic growth and inflation proved to be reasonably on target, but the unemployment rate rose far more than we had expected. According to currently available data, real GDP growth was close to zero last year, with a sharp contraction in the first half of […]

Incoming data continue to indicate that the economic recovery is taking hold. Deterioration in the labor market is abating. Household spending is expanding at a moderate pace. Tentative signs suggest that the housing sector may have bottomed, and housing construction has begun to grow. Financial market conditions have improved further. The employment report for the […]

The U.S. economy expanded at a 3.5% annual rate in the third quarter, ending a string of four straight quarters of negative growth. Consumer spending increased at a robust 3.4% annual rate in the third quarter, boosted by the cash-for-clunkers program. Not surprisingly, sales of motor vehicles fell sharply after the program ended. But the […]

Five key questions are often asked about current economic and financial conditions: Has the financial crisis ended? Is the recession over? Will the economy return to full employment and normal conditions anytime soon? Is inflation going to jump too high? Does the Federal Reserve have an “exit strategy” to undo its extraordinary policy actions of […]

On balance, it’s probable that the economy has reached bottom and begun its slow recovery. The course going forward surely won’t be smooth or painless, and clear risks remain. Housing activity has been showing fairly uniform signs of recovery. For example, housing starts and permits have been rising fairly steadily since the beginning of the […]

Financial markets are improving, and the crisis mode that has characterized the past year is subsiding. The adverse feedback loop, in which losses by banks and other lenders lead to tighter credit availability, which then leads to lower spending by households and businesses, has begun to slow. As such, investors’ appetite for risk is returning, […]