Skip to footer

Are we poised for an economic explosion?

Going into the end of the year, there's a debt deal in the works, no tapering in sight, and a slew of other economic indicators are turning positive. Will the economy skyrocket?

|
Richard Drew/AP
Trader Edward Curran, left, and F. Hill Creekmore works on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange Thursday, Oct. 17, 2013.

Let me set the scene for you:

* There is a Debt Deal in the works that removes the ceiling and related draconian cuts from the discussion til at least February. Out of sight, out of mind.

* There is no election this fall.

* There is no war with Syria and high level talks are happening with Iran for the first time in decades.

* The incoming Fed Chairperson is the most dovish in the institution's 100 year history. There will be no taper talk whatsoever so long as employment data remains muted. At least not this quarter and probably not until the spring barring a huge tsunami of good economic data.

* Stock markets around the world are selling at fair to absurdly cheap valuations.

* The banks are as highly capitalized as they have ever been.

* Home prices are back to long-term trend and appreciation continues despite recent mortgage slowdown -normalization being the operative word.

* US households reclaimed the 2007 peak in total net worth and have now surpassed it.

* Small and mid cap stocks are at all-time highs and yet still under-owned by the largest pools of capital in the US - pensions, endowments and insurance companies.

* Going back 110 years, when the Dow has been up in the first half, it's finished the year strong with gains in the back half 70% of the time.

* Hedge funds are at their highest net short positions since January and have massively trailed every equity benchmark you can think of.

Thats the set-up going into year-end.

What happens from here?  My guess would be that we have all the rocket fuel we need for an explosion.

Your thoughts?

You've read  of  free articles. Subscribe to continue.
Real news can be honest, hopeful, credible, constructive.
What is the Monitor difference? Tackling the tough headlines – with humanity. Listening to sources – with respect. Seeing the story that others are missing by reporting what so often gets overlooked: the values that connect us. That’s Monitor reporting – news that changes how you see the world.
editor@csmonitor.com
Subscribe
Mark Sappenfield
Editor

Dear Reader,

About a year ago, I happened upon this statement about the Monitor in the Harvard Business Review – under the charming heading of “do things that don’t interest you”:

“Many things that end up” being meaningful, writes social scientist Joseph Grenny, “have come from conference workshops, articles, or online videos that began as a chore and ended with an insight. My work in Kenya, for example, was heavily influenced by a Christian Science Monitor article I had forced myself to read 10 years earlier. Sometimes, we call things ‘boring’ simply because they lie outside the box we are currently in.”

If you were to come up with a punchline to a joke about the Monitor, that would probably be it. We’re seen as being global, fair, insightful, and perhaps a bit too earnest. We’re the bran muffin of journalism.

But you know what? We change lives. And I’m going to argue that we change lives precisely because we force open that too-small box that most human beings think they live in.

The Monitor is a peculiar little publication that’s hard for the world to figure out. We’re run by a church, but we’re not only for church members and we’re not about converting people. We’re known as being fair even as the world becomes as polarized as at any time since the newspaper’s founding in 1908.

We have a mission beyond circulation, we want to bridge divides. We’re about kicking down the door of thought everywhere and saying, “You are bigger and more capable than you realize. And we can prove it.”

If you’re looking for bran muffin journalism, you can subscribe to the Monitor for $15. You’ll get the Monitor Weekly magazine, the Monitor Daily email, and unlimited access to CSMonitor.com.

Subscribe to insightful journalism

QR Code to Are we poised for an economic explosion?
Read this article in
https://www.csmonitor.com/Business/The-Reformed-Broker/2013/1017/Are-we-poised-for-an-economic-explosion
QR Code to Subscription page
Start your subscription today
https://www.csmonitor.com/subscribe