While predicting recessions might be a fool’s errand, a generally reliable rule of thumb is that they come and go once a decade, and unlike in 2016, I do think right about now (next 12 months) is the time.
- You have the trade war with China, which is going from bad to worse now that the US has set to forcibly dismantle Huawei, a national champion of its hi-tech sector.
China is also now at basically the same the point as at which Japan and Korea experienced shocks during their equivalent stage of economic development.
- Stock market valuations, especially in the US, are near record highs. Now would probably be the least ideal time to go in.
In particular, while I am not one of those people who claims that search engines and social networks have no value. But I really don’t think Apple, Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft are worth in the $1 trillion range – well beyond the likes of Exxon or Boeing. Soaring valuations + near stagnant technology = tech bubble as in late 1990s.
- Other possible danger points: Chinese deleveraging; Europe’s PIGS, Turkey, Ukraine; shale oil bubble?; US student debt.
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Trump is toast if recession starts within the next year. He doesn’t fare well against Biden (rising in the polls) as is, will be unsalvageable if a recession comes down on top as well. If no recession, might be able to scrape out a win against Biden, and has a good chance against someone like Kamala Harris.
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I am bullish on crypto (note the date: 1BTC = $5,030 then, now north of $8,000):
https://twitter.com/akarlin88/status/1117689645666533377
China – US trade war makes this particularly attractive. In London, I met a BTC trader who thinks it will hit $20k in 1-2 years, and a major US-based BTC miner who estimates $100k within 5 years.
- Bearish on oil/resource prices. China is going to be slowing down as it readjusts to the trade war, and we’re approaching the point at which new inductions of electric vehicles are starting to have a noticeable impact on demand.
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Russia. On the one hand, having already spent 2014-16 in recession implementing reforms and rationalizing its banking system, it’s well prepared for another one. OTOH, it is a “high beta” economy that is especially sensitive to trends in the global economy. I am not particularly glum, but not particularly positive, either.
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However, there’s no big mania like you had in the mid-2000s, so I think this recession will be pretty mild.
I do think crypto is the best deal atm, even if one missed the ramp up from $5,000 to $8,000. Bearish on pretty much everything else: Stocks, oil, China, Moscow property, etc.
Dollar should be safe, as everyone flees to US Treasury bonds in a storm (assuming the eternal prophets of petrodollar collapse finally get it right).
*** Usual disclaimer that I am not qualified to give financial advice, that this is written for entertainment purposes, etc., etc. ***
Please keep off topic posts to the current Open Thread.
If you are new to my work, start here.
I’ve stated several times that I believe a recession is coming. Other factors:
• Inverted yield curve
• Exports from Japan, South Korea, and Germany (i.e. capital goods) are all down
• Garbage companies that will never make a profit like WeWork, Uber, and Lyft all IPOing
Stocks are expensive but not bubbly. Expect mediocre returns going forward, but no repeat of the GFC or the turn of the century.
I’m not going to tell anyone to stay out of crypto as money can be made there, but my personal take is that it’s not actually an asset class. There are no cashflows and the product itself has very little utility–basically black market transactions and anonymous payments. It’s also strongly vulnerable to state repression, and contrary to myth it’s not actually resistant to this at all. The state can shut down exchanges and throw HODLers in prison if it so chooses. The idea that crypto will replace national currencies is an absurd fantasy.
Other contributing recession triggers:
– we have not had a breakthrough technology or a product for a few years – the natural ebb and flow of consumer demand will slow down the economy
– the insolvency generational bubble is growing with younger US consumers ageing with personal balance sheets deeply in red: school costs, housing, lower relative incomes, heavy taxes focused on younger people.
It could be shallow because so many broke people can’t be more broke. One factor to consider: interest rates are still very low – the usual first step in a slow-down is to drop them and ease on lending requirements. There is not much room to lower interest rates in US – and in Europe they are effectively at zero already. Loosening credit standards will be really hard so soon after the 2007-8 debacle.
That leaves a war. And we have just the right set of players in place around the world for some mindless use of the accumulated munition. I personally think Antarctica has been asking for it – damn penguins and their patriarchy – but it could be anybody. Nobody has been sufficiently virtuous for the messianic rulers in Washington.
What about all of those 1099 gig jobs with expenses dumped on the “employees,” the half of all Americans deemed “employed” who work just part time, the 95 million citizens (ages 16 to 65) who are not in the labor force and the 6 to 8 million new Unemployment Compensation applicants each month who are counted as unemployed? I see the dual-high-earner above-firing parents in their two family-friendly jobs per household. They have tons of time off and money for vacation after vacation, but although over 50% of polled individuals told Gallup they were enthusiastic about this economy, 36% said they worry every month about how they’ll cover basic bills.
Twenty percent of Americans are retirement age, with one small SS check coming in to cover unaffordable rent if not a paid-for house and two bigger SS checks for the retired dual-high-earner parents who also have two 401k or other pension streams coming in to cover bills. If you subtract the retired dual high earners out along with the top 20% of current dual-earner parents in above-firing jobs, that’s about 40% of the population that is exempt from concerns about the brutal economy.
Then we have about 20% of single-breadwinner households with kids, including womb-productive legal / illegal immigrant households, who don’t have to stress too much if they work part time, staying under the earned-income limits for womb-productivity-based welfare, since their rent, groceries and electricity will be covered by taxpayers along with monthly cash assistance and up to $6,431 in refundable child tax credit cash.
That leaves about 36% — 40% of Americans reliant on earned-only income from the brutal churn-gig / part-time economy who have been in a recession for about 40 years.
All of that seems pretty likely. I don’t have a firm opinion on cryptos. Yes, the government can shut it down (at least a powerful government like the US), but it would probably be difficult to gather the necessary political will. Precisely because it’s so useful for anonymous or illegal payments. Presumably rich and influential people would find it handy. There’s also the issue of greater power rivalry, though with the coming fragmentation of the internet foreign powers might find it difficult to keep crypto’s alive inside the sphere of another power. But for example we have the Tor browser and a number of similar technologies precisely because the Americans use them to destabilize foreign regimes like Iran, Russia or China. (Or at least try to do so.)
Germany is already in a recession when looked at in per capita growth terms. So is Italy and France is very close to it.
It’s been a long way coming, given the very long global recovery. The US is slated to have a whopping 5% deficit this year as per IMF estimates which is what is powering them through, temporarily.
The key question is if this recession, if it comes more broadly to the world, is here to stay. Most of Asia still tries to follow the path of export-led industrialisation, most notably ASEAN and especially Vietnam among them. However, this is all dependent on infinite population growth and consumption in the West. Europe is unlikely to see large population growth because this population can only come from Sub-Saharan Africa and MENA, which will clash with the rise of the populist right.
New migrants entering the EU in the first five months of this year is the lowest since 2013. It may or may not stay that way, but I doubt Lega is going anywhere and soon Vox could rise to a similar position if Spain becoming the dumping ground of Europe. It won’t matter what Brussels thinks. The US could carry global consumption better but it isn’t the year 2000 anymore. Their share of global GDP continually falls, as it should. China may be rebalanacing towards consumption but their population is aging fast and their working-age population is declining since 2012. After the rebalance is done, there will be limited room for consumption given that exports are a closed alley for them now. Their debt problems are also unresolved and in fact rising.
This leaves India but India is currently undergoing problems on consumption themselves, despite a bloated deficit. Auto sales fell by double digits this year so far and sales of FCMG is also barely crawling along. India is also an inward-looking society which has failed to industrialise on the path of East Asia. They are reliant on domestic consumption and much of this growth in the past half-decade has been on the back of rapidly rising household debt.
In short, I think we may witness a structural slowdown in the 2020s. Many high-IQ countries will do fine in terms of productivity due to very rapid technological advances. Countries like mine could see rising unemployment and social unrest as we are traditionally at the frontier of technological innovation and we have large amounts of people from MENA/SSA already on the dole. So any productivity growth could be offset by falling consumption as fewer people are employed.
The continued rise of population growth in SSA and MENA also means that even if the world reaches a slower growth equilibrium, the pressure of migration will rise, and so will the political response. A stagnant Italy will remain a far superior choice to any third world shithole for decades to come, even if they can only live in the shadows working in the grey economy for crappy wages (by Italian standards). It will still be an order of a magnitude better. Anyone thinking otherwise should google images of Lagos slums.
P.S. Oh and this naturally caps any continued V4 convergence to a slower pace simply because these are highly export-dependent countries mostly to other EU-28 states. The coming slashing of EU funds in the post-2020 period won’t help either, coupled with “rule of law” terms to possibly withhold funds alltogether (looking to destroy Orban etc).
Oh, and there’s also this.
https://i.imgur.com/0Gf0J7b.png
Beckow,
I don’t mean to be intrusive but I addressed you personally on another thread and, as far as I can see, there hasn’t been a reaction from your side. I am not sure if this is due to a lack of interest or because you haven’t noticed the post. In any case, would you be so kind and clarify the issue by replying to my inquiry?
Regards,
Pharmakon
p.s. Apologies for the OT.
“China is also now at basically the same the point as at which Japan and Korea experienced shocks during their equivalent stage of economic development.”
No. Not at all. China is still poorer and less urbanised than Japan in 1990.
It has a large space to grow, plus OBOR.
“China has about the same proportion of city dwellers as the U.S. did in 1940
While President Trump’s boasts that China is hurting from the trade war are no doubt true, some of its biggest economic drivers over the past 40 years remain intact today. One such tailwind is the huge wealth and spending created as people move from the countryside to cities—a process that still has decades to run. That’ll fuel demand for jobs, apartments and services, beefing up the purchasing power of another 300 million to 400 million people.”
China will grow reliably up to 2040 at least.
“The Trade war”
Chinese reliance on foreign trade is relatively low. IMF estimated losses for China due to trade war issues are not that big either.
“US has set to forcibly dismantle Huawei”
The US can not dismantle Huawei, it already has the biggest (and growing) market in the world cornered. The US can slow it down, but it can not dismantle it. And, of course, the vast majority of countries in the world are willing to work with that company contrary to US wishes. Huawei isn’t going anywhere, it can be slowed down, but not dismantled.
As for the recession coming in the US, i’m surprised you did not mention the yield curve. It will start in one year.
Last time (in 2008) Asia continued to grow fast regardless of the deep slump in the US, we will see what happens this time.
You’re always bearish about the chances of American presidents in their re-election campaigns.
There’s two things you neglect:
First of all, RE: polling data, at this point, who cares? My response to “Biden polls ahead of Trump” news stories, here in May of 2019, is quite literally to wave my hand dismissively. A) It’s all but too early to care. B) They’re usually wrong this far out. C) Most people seem totally neglectful of the fact that national polling data is of trash value in analyzing an election determined by the Electoral College. If someone had paid attention to state polling data in Florida, NC, WI, PA, OH, and MI, then they would not have been so shocked when Hillary managed to lose all of them. Wisconsin was the only real surprise – Trump was within the margin of error in the others.
Second, it’s almost impossible to understate how hard it is for once-elected American presidents to lose re-election campaigns. since 1900, only two elected American presidents have failed to win re-election in years where they faced no third party rival (E.G. Teddy Roosevelt, Perot) or a strong primary challenger. Hoover in 1932, and Carter in 1980. Hoover had helped turn a bad recession into a terrible depression; Carter had a perfect storm of problems, including a bad recession.
The idea that Trump, absent a recession, would merely “grind out” a win over Biden, to me, is almost comical. Sure, the popular vote would be close-ish, but who cares? Trump would still be fine in the EV count. For one thing, Biden is not going to dramatically improve black turnout. The lack of black turnout being what really crippled Hillary. Black voters in America traditionally show their disapproval by not showing up – I see no reason to think they’d be more excited for “Sleepy Joe.” Second, Biden probably isn’t going to dramatically improve Hillary’s results among Hispanics, which was another weak point for her. Personally, I think they will nominate someone other than Biden, if they have any sense, because, useless polling data from early 2019 aside, he’d be a trash candidate against Trump who would fix none of Hillary’s problems.
All my words aside, where we agree is that Trump will likely lose if a strong recession kicks in.
But even then, if you look at past election results, the recession really needs to wait until as late as August or September of 2020 if it’s going to cripple Trump. Historically, several Presidents have managed to win re-election in the midst of strong recessions if the downturns started early enough that they could find a way to campaign around them. The most obvious example being that scumbag FDR.
If the tech tyrants go bankrupt and the status quo governments collapse, what is wrong in supporting a global economic meltdown? It would be a boon for white nationalism.
I will reply.
“New migrants entering the EU in the first five months of this year is the lowest since 2013.”
Do you have a link?
New immigrants total or just the illegal immigrants coming from the South? Those are quite different. Yes, the illegal immigration did decline. But legal immigration is continuing. In 2018 non-EU immigration towards the UK has increased significantly, while the German government recently relaxed the rules for non-EU migrants. Sweden is taking lots of legal migrants. Spain is taking a huge amount of legal migrants too.
Illegal migrants. Don’t have the link at hand, but it comes from IOM, saw the data on twitter. You can find it if you have the time/energy. Illegal migration is of course more than just the med crossings (tourist visa fraud is an occuring issue), but it is generally easier to crack down on that, too. Sweden raised its educational fees by a lot some years back and saw permanent declines by massive amounts. Boats are harder to deal with over the long term since it doesn’t require permission to come from the host country in the first place, unlike visa fraud.
As for legal migrants, a lot of non-EU migrants come from Ukraine, Balkans etc. So keep that in mind.
Unlike the GOP, which loves legal immigration, I don’t see Lega moving in that direction. Italians like living in an Italian country. Spain is another issue, they get a lot of people from LatAm and those migrants tend to easily assimilate, but it is of course an issue from a purely HBD standpoint.
My point about labour-reducing productivity is about the coming years. Your point is about the past. Shutting off legal migration from, say, India is a lot easier than stopping the boats crossing the med. The UK government showed that in 2011 when Indian visas fell by over half in just a few years, and it could have fallen a lot more had they wanted to. Most non-white legal migrants come from such places. Increased or at least stable legal migration is only tenable if you believe the current world growth will remain unchanged and if you think that increasing labour-saving technological progress will not occur in any major capacity going ahead. Neither assumption is tenable.
I can’t see BTC being anything other than a curiousity. It has too many technical limitations. Etherium perhaps, one day.
And yes, winter is coming but the oil price will drop and keep us warm quite quickly. Tracking down the tax liabilities of the super rich will be a challenge. The Barclay Brothers pay Boris Johnson £250,000 a year via the Daily Telegraph. Not for his journalism? Wigmore, the third Brexiter has his own tax haven in Belize.
The US tariffs on China have been paid almost entirely by US importers: IMF study
Indeed.
In constant 2010 dollars it is poorer than Japan was in the 1970s, yet far more indebted already.
Agreed. Huawei is too big now, and very diversified in technology. They even do undersea cables.
Depends what we mean by ‘reliably’. In the 3%-4% range? Sure. But not much faster than that unless they want to gorge on even more debt, which is indeed what they are doing now. Most people are not aware of how indebted China is once you look at private debt, local debt etc. Total debt is at 300% of GDP, far higher than any East Asian country was at in a similar position.
Yeah, i found it.
“Spain is another issue, they get a lot of people from LatAm and those migrants tend to easily assimilate, but it is of course an issue from a purely HBD standpoint.”
I don’t know, 60k (just the illegals) came last year from Africa. There is some steady flow coming from there.
Btw legal immigration also means family reunification (chain migration) and this is a significant part of it.
But its population also has huge savings, plus the country has large FX reserves. As large amount of its population is still rural, this will fuel growth into the future.
Current estimates are for 5,5 % during the 2020s and 3 – 3,5 % for the 2030s.
The tech boom was propped up by gov’t money (mostly MIC). Same with a lot of 1099 consulting, etc. Most of it is just degrees of separation from actual gov’t work. But seriously, does anyone think SV is paying silly money to tech workers because there is insane money in ad revenues or smart phones apps or software programs?? And you now have two or three generations of workers thinking this is normal.
If job market does start to soften, it would present Trump with a very attractive option of calling for complete moratorium on immigration for five years. The Overton window is wide open right now, a soft economy with increasing unemployment actually is one of the best backdrops for shutting the immigration spigot like 1924.
Are you bearish on healthcare too?
All your opinions are the same as public consensus, it’s always a good idea to take the opposite of consensus.
Therefore I am long US Stocks, long oil, long China, long Moscow property, long healthcare stocks
short US dollar, short US treasuries, short crypto
I expect btc to fall 99%
That will only work if the process of urbanisation isn’t sowing the seeds of its own destruction. China has a massive housing bubble already akin to Japan in the 1980s, at much lower per capita incomes.
And by the way, I was wrong. Japan in 1960 had a higher per capita income (in constant 2010 dollars) than China does today. Despite that, China’s debt profile is far worse. Total debt to GDP is at 300% according to Bank of International Settlements data.
growing economy causes urbanization, not the other way around, you cant generate real economic growth just by helicopter dropping people from rural villages into cities. In fact, migrant workers are beginning to return to villages because of the lack of jobs in cities.
Yes — that, undoubtedly, and other reasons. It is an open secret that Tor is not only supported, but was in fact commissioned, by the US government.
Tor, to security types, is a little like driving through a slum in a Mercedes with blacked-out windows: the cops (usually) can’t see you, but they certainly do notice you.
In fact, Tor is a bit like the police setting up a fancy, yet cost-effective, window-tinting service in the ‘hood, and advertising it as specially designed for protection against the police. Not only do all the gangstas get the tint, the cops have the special machine which can see through it.
This is the best reason why TPTB will do everything in their power to engineer the reversal by the middle of next year at the latest. You can bet on it–I will.
Tor is open source, if it had had a backdoor, the open source community would’ve found it a long time ago.
It’s just that it doesn’t make the rest of your equipment safe – they can get to your router, your computer, your OS, your antivirus software, etc. So really, the Mercedes (or even, any car) with blacked-out windows is a good analogy. If you are using Tor with Linux, then you certainly look like someone with something to hide. Unless you use some safe equipment (how can you make your router and GPU with inbuilt backdoors safe?), they will get you anyway.
So it’s really the cops distributing a special anti-cop window-tinting service, simply so that they can know who’s buying. It’s impossible for them to see through it alright, but they put you on a list of suspicious people. It even costs a lot of money, so mostly just real criminals will want to buy it. (I have never used or even downloaded the Tor browser, but I think it’s very slow and so people only use it if they really have something to hide. The cost here being not the price you pay for it, but rather the time lost, which is actually more valuable to most people.)
Yup, urbanisation does drive growth. Cities offer greater efficiencies than villages.
For more on this here
https://siteresources.worldbank.org/EXTPREMNET/Resources/489960-1338997241035/Growth_Commission_Vol1_Urbanization_Growth.pdf
@Thulean Friend
They can move hundreds of millions into the cities. I don’t see it as a housing bubble. They will need to build lots of cities, houses and apartments for that huge rural population as the country urbanises further. That process (massive city building) will take at least two more decades.
Isn’t that debt they owe to themselves? Pretty sure some of that cancels out.
There is no doubt about their debt problem, on the other hand their population does have a large savings rate (unlike the US population), and they do have large FX reserves.
Moreover, there is OBOR, something Japan did not had. Its purpose is to tie the world to China. This will provide growth benefits too.
Then China offers massive economy of scale and the benefits of it compared to Japan.
So i certainly do not see China right now as another Japan.
Yes — as you point out, they don’t really need a back door.
Tom Mysiewicz in his latest piece at this site is certainly quite bearish on the economy today. His pointing out that the trucking sector has been seriously deflated as of late hits home in Arizona, and is a sure telltale sign that the economy is quickly changing for the worse.
https://www.unz.com/article/the-hidden-side-of-the-mueller-report/
Didn’t Bush senior also lost re-election to Clinton ?
There was a strong third party candidate.
So a recession discussion and not one world about the enormous credit bubble, especially in consumer credit (have you seen the auto loan numbers? or student loans?). If there are any substantial job losses in the next recession, this shit goes supernova unlike even 2008-9.
Of course, when have Main Street’s issues ever carried in weight with the cunts on Wall Street and in DC? We know who’s getting a lifeboat if the fake-ass stock market has a hiccup, because that’s what matters, damn it!
Witness the efficiencies!
https://cdn.dnaindia.com/sites/default/files/styles/full/public/2016/07/18/482880-slums-mumbai-dharavi.jpg
Yes he will. The black media is in love with Biden. The black people respond to the black media. It’s different than with Hillary. Biden has the blacks’ approval, and that’s that.
Remember that Trump only won because he won WI, MI and/or PA. He needs to keep one of those. Now let’s look at the figures.
He won:
Why is this dangerous:
– More than a handful of working class white voters will switch back to Biden from Trump. Older, retired union guys who will vote out of habit.
– Biden will improve among blacks, maybe not a great deal but any small improvement could easily swing all three states. Large black urban counties saw massive decreases in D votes in 2016, in the 10,000s or more range. Wayne County, MI (Detroit) saw a massive 75,000 vote drop in the D category compared to 2012. That alone won Michigan 6x over for Trump! Biden will certainly do better than Hillary.
– Demographic changes. The opioid epidemic continues to kill working class white men, Trump’s core base. Further, natural aging processes means that a number of white, rural Trump voters have simply died of old age since 2016. The immigration to the USA is constant, so there are at least 4 million new citizens who will vote 75% D.
– People disappointed in him. Trump has failed on immigration. That’s why he was elected, because deep down white America felt that he would restore the country (imo). He’s failed, and more than a few people (see even here) have taken note and will not vote in 2020.
Where Trump will be strong: I believe Hispanics do not like Biden, but many do like Trump. Trump will run strong in FL, TX, and AZ. He’ll do well in the Cotton Belt GA and NC. He may just win NH and ME-1. This provides an extremely narrow path to victory.
But either way. You can see than even just with natural births/deaths, Trump is in trouble in MI and probably in WI. One can pretty easily guess that the white growth rate has been more than -2,500 per year in Michigan. Any slight noise can breach his firewall.
Trump is finished. The recession just puts another nail in his coffin. Unless he declares drastic action on immigration now, staves off the recession, and is able to exploit Creepy Joe (his names are getting old), he’s toast. I give him a 10% chance. Enjoy Mehico Norte.
Ha – ha! After a year of waiting for his 3-d chess moves, I got weary. After 2, I grew disillusioned. Now I don’t give a shit. If he pulls a surprise out his ass, I would love it. But I’m pretty blackpilled about our collective future in this current system now.
You are correct that Americans (and Canadians) would absolutely love to stop all immigration right now, to keep our homelands white. Only Quebec has made actual strides in this direction. All white people think this on some level, though 60% seem to pretend otherwise. But Blumpf is a huge dud and the white race is doomed in NA. Shoulda voted in Perot in ’96.
In China they have Ghost cities not slums like India. Have you ever wondered why ? Perhaps it has something to do with planning ahead for rapid urbanisation.
According to reliable super high IQ financial data I have seen, by next year, oil price is going to accelerate into hyperdrive
which jibes with Buffett’s position
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/05/06/buffett-says-occidental-petroleum-investment-is-a-bet-on-oil-prices-over-the-long-term.html
There are no true ghost cities in China. And I would only describe two large districts as highly underutilized.
Kangbashi district of Ordos in Inner Mongolia (it has been cited as an example for a decade by the Western media as a ghost city).
Yujiapu Financial District in Tianjin (underused central business district of tall skyscrapers)
What support do these ‘super high IQ financial data’ firms that you rely on provide for this belief in an acceleration into ‘hyperdrive’ for oil prices? It’s hard to see if the economy goes into a recession? Buffet was only speaking about one company, not giving a bullish assessment of the whole industry.
He’s an idiot (the commenter neir, not Warren Buffett).
“[Crypto] Yes, the government can shut it down (at least a powerful government like the US), but it would probably be difficult to gather the necessary political will.”
I wouldn’t underestimate the power of the deepstate here. Before Trump’s election, Newsweek and other media in the United States were coordinating a harassment campaign aimed at doxxing the creator of Bitcoin. The obvious point of the exercise was to discourage others from following in his footsteps. They also tried linking crypto to terrorism and racism in an effort to get it banned. Look for them to continue this after Trump loses in 2020. Authoritarian Western governments aren’t going to allow their populations access to sources of funding that might undermine them. You are only allowed enough freedom to think you are free. People also once claimed that the internet was an uncontrollable information distribution instrument that would bring enlightenment to the world. Ask all those dissidents who have been deplatformed if they still feel that way.
But it’s not a very well centralized system, so many in the elites might be utilizing cryptos for illegal payments. That’s why I’m not sure if they’ll be illegal.
i guess only by next year will you understand the difference between regular people and the super high IQ.