Even the UK consumer can not always spend “more more more”

The issue of retail sales is one that has become a signal of our times in various ways. It has long been considered a support for economic growth especially in my home country the UK. However there are places where economics would like more of it such as in the surplus countries Germany and Japan which would then help with rebalancing world trade via higher imports. In more recent times the green agenda clearly implies lower retail sales although something which is likely to be as unpopular is that tends not to get much publicity. Finally there is the issue of the decline of the high street and the rise of online shopping. It is hard for shops to compete with companies willing to deliver even at 9 o’clock on a Sunday evening as I have observed recently.

Measuring such things is complex and let me illustrate with a story which starts well. From the US Census Bureau.

Advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for December 2019, adjusted for seasonal
variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $529.6 billion, an
increase of 0.3 percent (±0.4 percent)* from the previous month, and 5.8 percent (±0.7 percent) above
December 2018

I have highlighted the bit which shows that these are turnover or nominal rather than real figures. But there is more to it than meets the eye as whilst these look good there were downwards revisions I gather which mean that the Atlanta Fed GDP Nowcast thinks this.

 After this morning’s retail sales release from the U.S. Census Bureau, the nowcast of fourth-quarter real personal consumption expenditures growth declined from 2.3 percent to 1.6 percent.

As Avril Lavigne pointed out.

Why’d you have to go and make things so complicated?

The UK

The background has been provided by the British Retail Consortium.

Total sales for 2019 decreased by 0.1%, compared with 1.2% growth in 2018. This is the worst year on record…………Taking November and December together to iron out the Black Friday distortions, Total sales declined 0.9% compared with the same period in 2018…….Taking November and December together to iron out the Black Friday distortions, Like-for-Like sales declined 1.2% compared with the same period in 2018.

This is what produced the headlines which were copied across social media that this had been the worst year for UK retail since 1995. This was not the media’s finest hour as this was plainly rubbish to anyone who has any knowledge of the official data. Let us be generous and say that such a view is true for some of the department stores and so on struggling to compete with the virtual world.

Today’s data

We have been observing a slowing of the rate of growth as 2019 had developed and this continued in December.

Comparing the three months to December 2019 against the same three months a year ago, growth in the quantity bought increased by 1.6% in December 2019, despite a strong decline of 2.2% for department stores.

Along the way we get a reminder that department stores are essentially in a depression, which is backed up by this next bit,

Online sales as a proportion of all retailing was 19.0% in December 2019, compared with the 18.6% reported in November 2019.

Actually whilst we still have annual growth if we look more recently we have moved into a decline.

Looking at the three-month on three-month growth rate, the quantity bought in retail sales has not experienced growth for three consecutive months. The three months to October 2019 remained flat, while the three months to November and December fell by 0.5% and 1.0% respectively.

Indeed and it was a case of and the beat goes on if we look at December itself.

The quantity bought in December 2019 fell by 0.6% when compared with the previous month; the fifth consecutive month of no growth.

I am not quite sure why they say/write “no growth” when there is a perfectly useful word like decline available. Anyway we get very little detail for December but do from the three-monthly detail get more of a grip about what has happened in 2019.

Declines were seen across most sectors except for household goods stores and fuel. The strong decline of 3.2% in non-store retailing was largely because of a fallback from very strong growth in the previous three months for September at 4.0%, this included large monthly growth in July of 7.3%, which was attributed to large promotions in the sector. The quantity of goods bought in non-store retailing increased on the latest month by 1.0%.

This is a sort of a doppelganger of the situation in the US we observed earlier. There we saw December misleading as the trend whereas in the UK it was the surge in July and subsequent associated fall back which has muddied the water.

Also if we widen our perspective from pure economics perhaps the pressure on providers and sellers of cheap fashion clothing is having an impact.

Clothing experienced strong declines both on the month at negative 2.0% and in the three months to December at negative 2.3%. This is the sixth consecutive month of no growth for clothing stores for the three-month on three-month movement.

Comment

The situation regarding UK Retail Sales has been “slip-sliding away” as Paul Simon put it in the latter part of 2019. Care is needed as it had previously been very strong and it cannot keep surging. Even the UK consumer must tire eventually. But there are consequences from the apparent shift and clear food for thought is provided by the fact that an already weak last quarter of 2019 will have a downwards pull on its GDP of the order of 0.05%.

That then turns eyes to Threadneeedle Street and the Bank of England which told us this earlier this week. From Monday.

Gertjan Vlieghe, an external MPC member, said his view on whether to keep waiting for an economic revival or vote to lower rates from 0.75 per cent to 0.5 per cent would depend on survey data released towards the end of January.

The Retail Sales release is likely to have him at least singing along with Prince.

She’s never satisfied (She’s never satisfied)
Why do we scream at each other
This is what it sounds like
When doves cry

In a more sophisticated world where they are supposed to look forwards they should be noting that the sentiment reports have shown a post election rally. But back in the real world they have an itchy-finger for interest-rate cuts if the summer of 2016 is any guide. Although the Governor’s focus has changed.

Mark Carney said: “It’s an honour to be supporting the Prime Minister as the UK invites almost 200 countries to Glasgow in November to address the climate threat. This COP 26 Summit will be a critical moment for climate action.”

Will they fly in so that they can tell the rest of us not to fly?

If we return to the “worst year since 1995” release then even today’s weak numbers have scotched that. The lust for clickbait so often trumps reasoning and thought.

 

 

 

 

Is the US fiscal stimulus working?

One of the problems of economics is that reality rarely works out like theory. Indeed it is rather like the military dictum that tells us that a battle plan rarely survives first contact with the enemy. However we are currently seeing the world’s largest economy giving us a worked example of the policy being pushed by central bankers. Indeed it rushed to do so as we look back to the Jackson Hole symposium in the summer of 2017.

With tight constraints on central banks, one may expect—or maybe hope for—a more active response of fiscal policy when the next recession arrives.

Back on August 29th of that year I noted a paper presented by Alan Auerbach and Yuriy Gorodnichenko which went on to tell us this.

We find that in our sample expansionary government spending shocks have not been followed by persistent increases in debt-to-GDP ratios or borrowing costs (interest rates, CDS spreads). This result obtains especially when the economy is weak. In fact, a fiscal stimulus in a weak economy may help improve fiscal sustainability along the metrics we study.

Since then those two voices have of course been joined by something of a chorus line of central bankers and their ilk. But there was somebody listening or having the same idea as in short order Donald John Trump announced his tax cuts moving us from theory to practice.

Where are we now?

Led me hand you over to CNBC from two days ago.

The U.S. fiscal deficit topped $1 trillion in 2019, the first time it has passed that level in a calendar year since 2012, according to Treasury Department figures released Monday.

The budget shortfall hit $1.02 trillion for the January-to-December period, a 17.1% increase from 2018, which itself had seen a 28.2% jump from the previous year.

There is a sort of back to the future feel about that as the US returns to levels seen as an initial result of the credit crunch. If we look at the US Treasury website it needs a slight update but gives us an overall picture.

Year-end data from the September 2019 Monthly Treasury Statement of Receipts and Outlays of the United States Government show that the deficit for FY 2019 was $984 billion, $205 billion higher than the prior year’s deficit^[3]. As a percentage of GDP, the deficit was 4.6 percent, an increase from 3.8 percent in FY 2018.

So the out-turn was slightly higher but we see something a little awkward. If the US economy was booming as the Donald likes to tell us why was their a deficit in the first place and why is it rising?

We see that on the good side revenues are rising.

Governmental receipts totaled $3,462 billion in FY 2019. This was $133 billion higher than in FY 2018, an increase of 4.0 percent,

But outlays have surged.

Outlays were $4,447 billion, $339 billion above those in FY 2018, an 8.2 percent increase.

Economic Growth

Three, that’s the Magic Number
Yes, it is, it’s the magic number
Somewhere in this hip-hop soul community
Was born three: Mase, Dove and me
And that’s the magic number

It turns out that inadvertently De La Soul were on the ball about the economic growth required to make fiscal policy look successful. So there was method in the apparent madness of President Trump proclaiming that the US economy would grow at an annual rate of 3% or more. In doing so he was mimicking the numbers used in the UK,for example, after the credit crunch to flatter the fiscal outlook. Or a lot more bizarrely ( the UK does at least occasionally grow by 3%) by the current coalition government in Italy.

Switching now to looking at what did happen then as 2018 progressed things looked okay until the last quarter when the annualised growth rate barely scraped above 1%. A brief rally back to target in the opening quarter of last year was followed by this.

Real gross domestic product (GDP) increased at an annual rate of 2.1 percent in the third quarter of 2019 (table 1), according to the “third” estimate released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis. In the second quarter, real GDP increased 2.0 percent. ( US BEA )

If we now move forwards there is this.

The New York Fed Staff Nowcast stands at 1.1% for 2019:Q4 and 1.2% for 2020:Q1.

News from this week’s data releases decreased the nowcast for 2019:Q4 by 0.1 percentage point and left the nowcast for 2020:Q1 broadly unchanged.

Negative news from international trade data accounted for most of the decrease.

Should this turn out to be accurate then it will be damaging for the deficit because the revenue growth we observed earlier ( 4%) will fade. There is a risk of the deficit ballooning should things weaken further and outlays rise to to social spending and the like if the labour market should turn.So far it has only signalled a slowing of real wage growth.

Cost of the debt

A rising fiscal deficit means that the national debt will grow.

As deficits have swelled, so has the national debt, which is now at $23.2 trillion. ( CNBC )

Or as the Congressional Budget Office puts it.

Debt. As a result of those deficits, federal debt held by the public is projected to grow steadily, from 79 percent of GDP in 2019 to 95 percent in 2029—its highest level since just after World War II. ( care is needed here as it only counts debt held by the public not the total)

But as I pointed out back in August 2017 the baying pack of bond vigilantes seem soundly muzzled these days.

 So we have seen central banks intervening in fiscal policy via a reduction in bond yields something which government’s try to keep quiet. We have individual instances of bond yield soaring such as Venezuela but the last few years have seen central banking victories and defeats for the vigilantes.

So as a consequence we find ourselves in an era of “Not QE” asset purchases and more importantly for today’s purposes a long bond ( 30 year) yield of 2.25% or less than half of what it was at times in 2011. So the debt has grown but each unit is cheap.

The government’s net interest costs are also anticipated to
grow in 2019, increasing by $47 billion (or 14 percent),
to $372 billion.

This means that the total costs are much lower than would have been expected back in the day.

Comment

Has it worked? Party so far in that the economic outcome in the US was better than that in the UK, Europe and Japan. But the “winning” as President Trump likes to put it faded and now we see that economic growth at an expected just over 1% is rather similar to the rest of us except the fiscal deficit and national debt are higher. So whilst it was nice now we look ahead to a situation where it could become a problem. I do not mean in the old-fashioned way of rising bond yields because let’s face it “Not QE” would become “Not bond buying” to get them back lower.

But if you keep raising the debt you need economic growth and should the present malaise continue then the US will underperform the CBO forecasts which expect this.

After 2019, consumer spending and purchases of goods and services by federal, state, and local governments
are projected to grow at a slower pace, and annual output growth is projected to slow—averaging
1.8 percent over the 2020–2023 period—as real output returns to its historical relationship with
potential output.

There is also another problem which the CBO has inadvertently revealed showing that the certainty with which some speak is always wrong.

The largest factor contributing to that change
is that CBO revised its forecast of interest rates downward, which lowered its projections of net interest
outlays by $1.4 trillion.

So the fiscal stimulus has helped so far but now the hard yards begin and they will get a lot harder in any further slow down. In the end it is all about the economic growth.

The Investing Channel

 

 

The good news from lower UK inflation ( think real wages) may not last

Today brings the various UK inflation numbers into focus as we get the updates for consumer, producer and house prices. Already though the Bank of England has given its view on the general outlook.

Second, the most likely outlook is a further period of subdued growth, and hence a disinflationary backdrop
of a persistent – albeit modest – output gap.

That is from Michael Saunders who is giving a speech in Northern Ireland and we see him backing up the previously expressed view of UK inflation falling towards 1.25% in the early part of this year. It is sad though that he still uses the “output gap” that has worked so poorly even some ex-central bankers are being forced to admit it has been a failure. Here is the former Vice-President of the ECB ( European Central Bank) Vitor Constancio.

In “FED listens” events, they found that:..”there is more “slack” than the Fed had thought — more people who could still come into the labour force, particularly in poorer areas”. I am sure the same is true in Europe. Forget output gaps

If only those still in power would see the light and accept reality!

There is an irony in all of this as we note that whilst the Bank of England expects lower inflation it is presently trying to raise it and Micheal Saunders has another go.

Fourth, against this backdrop, it probably will be appropriate to maintain an expansionary monetary policy
stance and possibly to cut rates further, in order to reduce risks of a sustained undershoot of the 2% inflation
target. With limited monetary policy space, risk management considerations favour a relatively prompt and aggressive response to downside risks at present.

This is via the impact of their words on the value of the UK Pound £ and the way a lower value ( mostly via the role of the US Dollar in setting commodity prices) tends to raise subsequent inflation. You may note that the bi-polar view of monetary policy space continues to be in play as he joins Mark Carney’s statement that it is limited from last Wednesday which morphed into the equivalent of a Bank Rate cut of 2.5% as quickly as Thursday. What a difference a day made!

twenty four little hours
Brought the sun and the flowers where there use to be rain ( Dinah Washington )

If we complete the points made by Michael Saunders we see something of an obsession with output gap theory.

First, with softer global growth and high Brexit uncertainty, the UK economy has remained sluggish. The
slowdown has created a modest output gap, and there are signs that the labour market is turning.

Also something perhaps even sillier.

Third, the neutral level of interest rates may have fallen further over the last year or two, both in the UK and
externally.

Or, of course, it may not.

Consumer Inflation

The backdrop was worrying because US consumer inflation had risen yesterday and Euro area inflation had risen last week and that is before we get to this.

Also, Zimbabwe’s annual inflation rate (the one that is officially concealed) rose to 521% in December. ( Joseph Cotterill)

But the numbers were good possibly showing that a little knowledge is a dangerous thing.

The Consumer Prices Index (CPI) 12-month rate was 1.3% in December 2019, down from 1.5% in November 2019.

There were two main factors at play and I wonder if any of you spotted this one?

Restaurants and hotels, where prices for overnight hotel accommodation fell by 7.5% between November and December 2019, compared with a rise of 0.9% between November and December 2018;

Also the next one may have affects elsewhere because the last time we saw a burst of this as we saw retail sales rise in response ( thank you ladies) which is against the present consensus.

Clothing and footwear, where the largest individual downward contributions came from women’s casual jackets and cardigans, where prices fell between November and December 2019 but rose between the same two months in 2018. There were also small individual downward contributions from formal trousers and formal skirts

Also if we continue to look wider we see a possible impact from the slow down in car sales.

There was also a smaller downward contribution from the purchase of vehicles where prices overall were little changed in 2019 but increased by 0.7% in 2018.

Let us move on but not without noting that the impact of the UK Pound £ is for once zero compared to the Euro as we have the same inflation rate.

Euro area annual inflation is expected to be 1.3% in December 2019,

What Happens Next?

There is still a slight downwards push but the impetus has gone.

The growth rate of prices for materials and fuels used in the manufacturing process was negative 0.1% on the year to December 2019, up from negative 1.9% in November 2019.

Indeed if we switch to output prices we see that there are ongoing albeit small rises in play.

The headline rate of output inflation for goods leaving the factory gate was 0.9% on the year to December 2019, up from 0.5% in November 2019.

If we look to future influences we know that 70% of the input number comes from the £ and the oil price. As we stand at US $64.40 for a barrel of Brent Crude that is where it roughly was in mid-December so maybe not much influence. With the Bank of England engaging in open mouth operations against the £ it may come into play.

House Prices

There was a worrying change here.

UK average house prices increased by 2.2% over the year to November 2019, up from 1.3% in October 2019……Average house prices increased over the year in England to £251,000 (1.7%), Wales to £173,000 (7.8%), Scotland to £155,000 (3.5%) and Northern Ireland to £140,000 (4.0%).

This adds a little credibility to the Halifax 4% reading for December although we await the official December data. As to the breakdown we have observed parts of the Midlands leading the line in recent times.

The annual increase in England was driven by the West Midlands and North West…..The lowest annual growth rate was in the East of England (negative 0.7%) followed by London (positive 0.2%).

Although that is for just England so we should also look wider and whilst it looks an anomaly there was this.

House price growth in Wales increased by 7.8% over the year to November 2019, up from 3.6% in October 2019, with the average house price in Wales at £173,000.

Comment

There is some much needed good news in today’s report for real wage growth as we see inflation dip. However we need context because if we switch to the UK’s longest running measure of inflation there is a different story in play.

The all items RPI annual rate is 2.2%, unchanged from last month.

The difference neatly illustrates my major theme in this area.

Other housing components, which increased the RPI 12-month rate relative to the CPIH 12-month rate by 0.06 percentage points between November and December 2019. The effect came mainly from house depreciation.

As you can see our official statisticians are desperate to make everyone look at their widely ignored favourite measure called CPIH which I will cover in a moment. But for now we see that past house prices via depreciation are exerting an upwards pull on the RPI and November’s number suggests this may continue. Most will understand that for many house prices are a big deal but the fact that they usually pull inflation higher means the establishment has launched an increasingly desperate campaign to ignore them.

If we now cover the official CPIH measure it indulges in a fleet of fantasy by assuming that owners pay themselves rent and then includes this fantasy in its inflation reading. Even worse there have been problems in measuring rents so it may well be a fantasy squared should such a thing exist. Anyway the effort to reduce the inflation reading has backfired this month as CPIH is above CPI due to this.

In December 2019, the largest upward contribution to the CPIH 12-month inflation rate came from housing and household services. The division has provided the largest upward contribution since November 2018.

Oh well…..

Where next for the Japanese Yen and the Bank of Japan?

As the third most traded currency the Japanese Yen is one of the bedrocks of the world economy. In spite of the size and strength of the Japanese economy the currency tail can wag the economy dog as we saw on the period of the “Carry Trade” and its consequences. For newer readers I looked at the initial impact back on the 19th of September 2016.

 Ironically if done on a large-scale as happened back in the day with the Swiss Franc and the Japanese Yen it lowers the currency and so not only is the interest cheaper but you have a capital gain. What could go wrong? Well we will come to that. But this same effect turned out to make things uncomfortable for both Japan and Switzerland as their currencies were pushed lower and lower.

At that point borrowers were having a party as the got a cheaper borrowing rate and a currency gain but the Japanese ( and Swiss) saw their currency being depressed. However the credit crunch ended that party as currency traders saw the risk and that people might buy Yen to cover the risk. Thus there was a combination of speculative and actual buying which saw the Yen strengthen from over 120 Yen to the US Dollar to below 80.

There were various impacts from this and starting in Japan life became difficult for its exporters and some sent production abroad as the mulled an exchange rate of around 78 to the US Dollar. For example some shifted production to Thailand. Looking wider the investors who remained in the carry trade shifted from profit to loss. On this road in generic terms the typical Japanese investor often described as Mrs. Watanabe was having a rough patch as in Yen terms their investments went being hit. Actually that is something of a generic over my career for Mrs Watanabe as timing of investments in say UK Gilts or Australian property has often been poor. Of course as it turns out property in Oz did work but you would have needed plenty of patience.

Enter the Bank of Japan

The next phase was a type of enter the dragon as the Bank of Japan in 2013 embarked on an extraordinary monetary stimulus programme. Under the banner of Abenomics that was designed to weaken the Yen although it was not officially one of the 3 arrows it was supposed to fire. For a while this worked as the Yen fell towards 125 to the US Dollar. But just as economics 101 felt it could celebrate a rare triumph the Yen then strengthened again and actually rallied to 101 in spite of negative interest-rates being deployed  leading to yet another new effort called QQE and Yield Curve Control in September 2016.

So we see that Japan had some success in weakening the Yen but that then ended and even with negative interest-rates and the purchases by the Bank of Japan below there was a fizzling out of any impact.

The Bank will purchase Japanese government bonds (JGBs) so that their amount outstanding will increase at an annual pace of about 80 trillion yen.

But you see these things have unintended consequences as Brad Setser points out below.

Japanese investors have been big buyers of foreign bonds—and U.S. bonds in particular. The lifers, the Japanese government through the government pension fund (GPIF), the Japanese government through Post Bank (which takes in deposits and cannot make loans so it buys foreign bonds since it cannot make money buying JGBs), and Norinchukin*

So a policy to weaken the Yen has a side-effect of strengthening it and even worse makes the global financial system more risky. Back to Brad.

In broad terms, a number of Japanese financial institutions have become, in part, dollar based intermediaries. They borrow dollars from U.S. money market funds, U.S. banks, and increasingly the world’s large reserve managers (all of whom want to hold short-term dollar claims for liquidity reasons) and invest in longer dated U.S. bonds.

What about now?

Things are rather different to this time last year when we were trying to figure out what had caused this?

The Japanese yen soared in early Asian trading on Thursday as the break of key technical levels triggered massive stop-loss sales of the U.S. and Australian dollars in very thin markets. The dollar collapsed to as low as 105.25 yen on Reuters dealing JPY=D3, a drop of 3.2 percent from the opening 108.76 and the lowest reading since March 2018. It was last trading around 107.50 yen………. ( Reuters )

That was from January 3rd whereas overnight we see this.

The major was trading 0.1 percent up at 110.09, having hit a high of 110.21 earlier, its highest since May 23.  ( EconoTimes )

On its own this may seen the Governor of the Bank of Japan have a quiet smile and a celebratory glass of sake. But falls in the Yen are associated with something else which will please the head of The Tokyo Whale.

TOKYO (Kyodo) — Tokyo stocks rose Tuesday, with the benchmark Nikkei index ending above 24,000 for the first time since mid-December, as investor sentiment improved on expectations for further easing of U.S.-China trade tensions. ( The Mainichi)

The Mainichi seems to have missed the currency connection with this but no doubt Governor Kuroda   will be pointing out both thresholds to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe.

Has something changed?

On Monday JP Morgan thought so. Via Forex Flow.

But because in recent years the yen is no longer being sold off in the first place, it is not acting as much like a safe-haven currency as in the past.

Okay so why?

if interest rates increase in other countries (opening a wider gap with rates in Japan)

Well good luck with that one! Maybe some day but the credit crunch era has seen 733 interest-rate cuts. However the Financial Times has joined in.

First, Japan is running trade deficits, which would imply a weaker currency. Second, domestic asset managers are busy buying higher-yielding foreign assets. Third, Japanese companies, confronting a chronic shortage of decent ways to deploy their capital at home, are increasingly spending it on deals overseas.

The last point is a really rather devastating critique of the six years of Abenomics as one of the stated Arrows was for exactly the opposite. Also there us more trouble for economics 101 as a lower Yen has seen a trade surplus switch to a deficit. Actually I think that responses to exchange rate moves can be very slow and measured in years so with all the ch-ch-changes it is hard to know what move is in play.

Comment

There is much to reflect on here. For example today may be one to raise a smile at the Bank of Japan as it calculates the value of its large equity holdings and sees the Yen weaken across a threshold. But it is also true that exactly the same policies saw the “flash rally” of over a year ago. In addition we see that the enormous effort in play to weaken the Yen has seen compensating side-effects which raise the risk level in the international finance system. Really rather like the Carry Trade did.

A warning is required because in the short-term crossing a threshold like 110 Yen sees a reversal but we could see the Yen weaken for a while. This is problematic with so many others wanting to devalue their currency as well with the Bank of England currently in the van. From a Japanese perspective this will be see as a gain against a nation they have all sorts of issues with.

“China has made enforceable commitments to refrain from competitive devaluation, while promoting transparency and accountability,” US Treasury Secretary, Steven Mnuchin, said.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly accused China of allowing the value of the yuan to fall, making Chinese goods cheaper.

But, on Monday, the US said that the value of the yuan had appreciated since August, at the height of the trade war. ( BBC )

How will that play out?

 

 

 

Even better than expected UK GDP seems unlikely to stop the Bank of England cutting interest-rates

Today brings the UK back into focus as we have what is called a theme day with data across a wide range of economic influences such as production, manufacturing,services ,construction. trade and most of all GDP ( Gross Domestic Product). Yes it is too many in one go and monthly GDP has already demonstrated a track record of being erratic but that has not deterred our official statisticians. But before we get to that the Bank of England has continued its campaign to talk the UK Pound £ lower over the weekend. Here is the Financial Times from yesterday.

An influential member of the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee has said he would vote for a cut in interest rates later this month if key data do not show a bounce in the economy following the December general election.

Have you guessed who it is? I have to say I would be far from sure as my view is that the other 8 members of the monetary policy committee or MPC exist to say “I agree with Mark (Carney)”. Mind you the Financial Times does love to flatter the establishment as we note that my theme that the other 8 members serve little or no useful purpose these days gets another tick in the box. Anyway here it is.

Gertjan Vlieghe, an external MPC member, said his view on whether to keep waiting for an economic revival or vote to lower rates from 0.75 per cent to 0.5 per cent would depend on survey data released towards the end of January.

That does not rule out a move this month as the meeting is at the end of it with the announcement on the 30th although of course they vote on the evening before. For “live” meetings this so-called improvement by Governor Carney is a really bad idea which has been reinforced recently by the news that hedge funds were receiving an “early wire” during press conferences.

We then get more of an explanation.

“Personally I think it’s been a close call, therefore it doesn’t take much data to swing it one way or the other and the next few [MPC] meetings are absolutely live,” he told the Financial Times. “I really need to see an imminent and significant improvement in the UK data to justify waiting a little bit longer.”

You might think that after the post EU leave vote debacle when it mistakenly rushed to cut interest-rates because of the surveys  the Bank of England might steer clear of relying on them so much.

We will get a lot of information as soon as the end of January,” said Mr Vlieghe. ““We’ll get a lot of business and some household surveys that cleanly relate to the period after the election, so that will give us an initial read as to how people are responding.”

We do get a slightly odd section which suggests that someone at the Financial Times has actually believed all the Forward Guidance mumbo-jumbo.

Financial markets are not currently pricing any movement in rates above the current 0.75 per cent over the next five years.

If you look at the five and two year Gilt yields in a broad sweep they have been suggesting a cut for some months now as regular readers will be aware.

Of course the media keep fooling for this as they get their moment in the headlines as we recall this from Dharshini David of the BBC last May.

Today the Bank of England’s Governor admitted to me that rates are likely to rise faster than the markets expect. So when can we expect the first move? My analysis for @BBCBusiness

She fell for the promises of the unreliable boyfriend hook line and sinker and in response has blocked me on Twitter.

Forward Guidance

It is hard not to have a wry smile at the Bank of England moves as the basic data has turned out better than expected. Let is open with today’s main number.

Rolling three-month growth was 0.1% in November 2019, down from an upwardly revised 0.2% in October.

Not much I admit but in the circumstances any growth is okay. Also that sentence is both true and misleading because October was originally reported as 0% but there have been ch-ch-changes since.

The UK economy grew slightly more strongly in September and October than was previously estimated, with later data painting a healthier picture.

We previously were told that both 3 monthly and monthly growth were 0% whereas now they are 0.2% and 0.1% respectively. So we are ahead of where we thought we were in spite of this.

Monthly gross domestic product (GDP) fell by 0.3% in November 2019, driven by falls in both services and production. This followed growth of 0.1% in both September and October 2019.

The monthly numbers are unreliable and are showing hints of a downwards bias as explained below.

However, both September and October 2019 have been revised up by 0.2 and 0.1 percentage points respectively, giving extra strength to the most recent rolling three-month estimate. The revisions to September were predominantly driven by new construction data, whereas October’s revisions were driven by new data in services and production.

It is good that the numbers are improved but the truth is that the variation is presently too high for them to be useful.

As to upwards surprises well the GDP number reinforces one from later on last week.

The latest survey of UK Chief Financial Officers shows an
unprecedented rise in business sentiment. The fourth quarter survey took place in the wake of the UK general election, between 13th December and 6th January. Confidence has seen the largest increase in the 11-year history of the survey taking it to its highest
ever level. ( Deloittes )

Manufacturing

If we look for the other side of the coin there is this from this morning.

The monthly decrease of 1.7% in manufacturing output was because of downward contributions from 10 of the 13 subsectors; led by notable falls from transport equipment (3.4%), chemicals and chemical products (4.7%) and food, beverages and tobacco (1.8%).

The November data meant that the last 3 months were poor too.

 compared with the three months to August 2019; this was led by manufacturing output, which fell by 0.8%.

If we look into the detail of the November data there is more than a little hope that it was driven lower by factors which we have got used to and in the latter case has been doing well overall.

the motor vehicles, trailers and semi-trailers industry (6.1%), which was impacted by factory shutdowns during November 2019…….widespread weakness from chemicals and chemical products (4.7%), following on from the impact of maintenance and shutdowns.

But the reason I have pointed this out is not only to show the other side of the coin but because this area is seeing quite a severe depression.

Manufacturing output in the UK remained 2.9% lower for the three months to November 2019 than the pre-downturn peak for the three months to March 2008.

It looked for a while that we might escape it but the impact of the trade war left our fingers grasping at air as we now face this.

Additionally, the current three-monthly rolling index level is the lowest since July 2017.

Comment

Regular readers will be aware that I thought the Bank of England was readying itself for an interest-rate cut last year. Now with its usual impeccable timing it seems to be forming up as a group just as the economic news shows a hint or two of being brighter. In addition to the data above this months Markit PMI showed an improvement as well albeit to somewhere around flatlining. The Deloittes survey was potentially especially revelant as it relates to business investment which has been weak and thus could have a spell of “catch up” now the political  and Brexit element looks clearer. As ironically Gerthan Vlieghe pointed out.

His main expectation was that the UK outlook would improve because there was a reduction in no-deal Brexit risks, plans for increased public spending and better news about a stabilised global economy.

But there is more to it than this as there is the fundamental issue of whether another 0.25% cut will make any difference. Having watched the latest prequel to the Alien(s) series of films over the weekend I am reminded of the words of the little girl Newt.

It won’t make any difference.

If we look at the weakest sector manufacturing all the interest-rate cuts we have seen have not turned things around and prevented a depression. Indeed if we look to Germany as we did only last week even an official interest-rate of -0.5% has not shielded its sector from the present trade war.

Podcast

The Bank of England gets ready for another cut interest-rate cut

Yesterday saw Bank of England Governor Mark Carney in full flow at the Bank of England itself in a type of last hurrah. I am grateful to him for being kind enough to exhibit at least 4 of the themes of this blog in one go! That is quite an achievement even for him. I will start by looking at something of a swerve which was introduced by the then Chancellor George Osborne and it has never received the prominence I think it deserves.

A major improvement to the inflation targeting framework itself was to confirm explicitly beginning with the
2013 remit that the MPC is required to have regard to trade-offs between keeping inflation at the target and
avoiding undesirably volatility in output. In other words, the MPC can use the full flexibility of inflation
targeting in the face of exceptionally large shocks to return inflation to target in a manner that provides as
much support as possible to employment and growth or, if necessary, promotes financial stability.

I make the point because you could argue from that date the Bank of England was acknowledging that its priority was no longer inflation targeting. Some of this was accepting reality as back in 2010 it had “looked through” inflation over 5%. To be more specific it is now concerned about inflation under target but much less so if it is above it. This is confirmed in the speech in part of the section on the period after the EU Leave vote.

Inflation rose well above the 2% target, eventually peaking at 3.1% in late 2017, an overshoot entirely due to
the referendum-induced fall in sterling.
UK growth dropped from the fastest to the slowest in the G7.

He cut interest-rates in this period in spite of the fact that the lower UK Pound £ meant that inflation would go in his words well above the 2% target. Actually tucked away on the speech is something of a confession of this.

In the wake of the referendum, the MPC’s
aggressive monetary easing, despite a sharply depreciating currency and rising inflation,

The Unreliable Boyfriend

It seems he cannot escape behaving like this and this week he has given us a classic example. We only need to go back to Wednesday for this.

In a wide-ranging interview with the Financial Times, the outgoing governor warned that central banks were running out of the ammunition needed to combat a downturn.

Yet a mere 24 hours or so later things were really rather different.

Of course, the effectiveness of unconventional policies means that there is considerable total policy space.
In the UK, the MPC can increase its purchases of both gilts and corporate bonds, providing stimulus through
a number of channels including portfolio rebalancing……..All told, a
reasonable judgement is that the combined conventional and unconventional policy space is in the
neighbourhood of the 250 basis points cut to Bank Rate seen in pre-crisis easing cycles.

Glen Campbell must be a bit disappointed as he famously took 24 hours to get to Tulsa whereas Governor Carney has managed the road to Damascus in the same time. Perhaps the new Governor Andrew Bailey had been on the phone. Anyway however you spin it “running out of ammunition” morphed into “considerable total policy space”.

Cutting Interest-Rates

Regular readers will be aware that I have been suggesting for a while now that the next move from the Bank of England will be to return us to a 0.5% Bank Rate. This was regarded as an emergency official interest-rate at the time but as so often language has been twisted and manipulated as it turned out to be long-lasting. I will discuss Forward Guidance in detail in a moment but for the moment let us just remind ourselves that Mark Carney has regularly promised interest-rate rises during his Governorship. Whereas yesterday we were given a hint of another U-Turn.

This rebound is not, of course, assured. The economy has been sluggish, slack has been growing, and
inflation is below target. Much hinges on the speed with which domestic confidence returns. As is entirely
appropriate, there is a debate at the MPC over the relative merits of near term stimulus to reinforce the
expected recovery in UK growth and inflation.

For newer readers central bankers speak in their own language and in it this is a clear hint of what is on its way.

Forward Guidance

The Governor cannot avoid a move which backfired rather quickly in his term.

The message the Committee gave UK households and businesses was simple: the MPC would not even
think about tightening policy at least until the unemployment rate had fallen below 7%, consistent with the creation of around three quarter of a million jobs.

The simple sentence below must have stung as he wrote it and later spoke it.

In the event, the unemployment rate fell far faster than the MPC had expected, falling below 7% in February
2014.

I will spare you the re-writing of history that the Governor indulges in but he cannot avoid confirming another issue I have raised many times.

As part of these exercises, the MPC revised down its (hitherto private) estimate of equilibrium unemployment rate from 6½% in August 2013 to 5½% in August 2014,

Actually the “hitherto private” claim is not true either as we knew. Also the equilibrium unemployment rather according to the Bank of England continued to fall and is now 4.25%. Thus as a concept it is effectively meaningless not only because it became a laughing stock but it’s use as an anchor was undermined by all the changes.

Anyway as we approach the end of the week it is opportune to have some humour, at least I hope this is humour.

 People understood the conditionality of guidance, as they and the MPC had learnt that there was still considerable
spare capacity in the economy.

I do love the idea that the (wo)man on the Clapham Omnibus had any idea of this! For a start it would have left them better informed than the Governor himself.

Inflation Targeting

I have argued many times that it needs reform and a major part of this should be to realise the influence of asset prices both pre and post credit crunch. On that road house prices need to go into the consumer inflation measure.

But apparently things have gone rather well.

This performance underscores that the bar for changing the regime is high.

I am not sure where to start with this.

Inflation expectations have remained anchored to the target, even when CPI inflation has temporarily moved away from it.

After all the Bank of England’s own survey told us this only last month.

 Asked about expectations of inflation in the longer term, say in five years’ time, respondents gave a median answer of 3.6%, up from 3.1% in August.

Comment

We can continue the humour with some number crunching Mark Carney style.

At present, there is sufficient headroom to at least
double the August 2016 package of £60 billion asset purchases, a number that will increase with further gilt
issuance. That would deliver the equivalent of around a 100 basis point cut to Bank Rate on top of the near
75 basis points of conventional policy space. Forward guidance at the ELB adds to this armoury. All told, a
reasonable judgement is that the combined conventional and unconventional policy space is in the
neighbourhood of the 250 basis points cut to Bank Rate seen in pre-crisis easing cycles.

So if 1% is from QE and 0.65% from an interest-rate cut to his “lower bound” of 0.1% then that means he is claiming that Forward Guidance can deliver the equivalent of 0.85% of interest-rate cuts. That really is something from beyond even the outer limits of credibility. Oh and I have no idea why he says “near 75 basis points of conventional policy space” when it is 0.65%.

As I have been writing this article a fifth theme of mine has been in evidence which is that these days Monetary Policy Committee members only seem to exist to say ” I agree with Mark”.

“If uncertainty over the future trading arrangement or subdued global growth continued to weigh on UK demand then my inclination is towards voting for a cut in bank rate in the near term,” she says. ( The Guardian)

That is Silvano Tenreyro who has rushed to be in line and it is especially disappointing as she is an external member. It is the internal members that have historically been the Governor’s lapdogs.

What are the economic prospects for the Euro area?

As we progress into 2020 there has been a flurry of information on the Euro area economy. However there has been quite a bit of dissatisfaction with the usual indicators so statistics offices have been looking  at alternatives and here is the German effort.

The Federal Office for Goods Transport (BAG) and the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) report that the mileage covered by trucks with four or more axles, which are subject to toll charges, on German motorways decreased a seasonally adjusted 0.6% in December 2019 compared with the previous month.

As a conceptual plan this can be added to the way that their colleagues in Italy are now analysing output on Twitter and therefore may now think world war three has begun. Returning to the numbers the German truck data reminds us that the Euro areas largest economy is struggling. That was reinforced this morning by some more conventional economic data.

Germany exported goods to the value of 112.9 billion euros and imported goods to the value of 94.6 billion euros in November 2019. Based on provisional data, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) also reports that German exports decreased by 2.9% and imports by 1.6% in November 2019 on the same month a year earlier. Compared with October 2019, exports were down 2.3% and imports 0.5% after calendar and seasonal adjustment.

We get a reminder that what was one if the causes of economic imbalance before the credit crunch has if anything grown as we note the size of Germany’s trade surplus.  It is something that each month provides support for the level of the Euro. Switching to economic trends we see that compared to a year before the larger export volume has fallen by more than import volume. This was even higher on a monthly basis as we note that the gap between the two widened. But both numbers indicate a contractionary influence on the German economy and hence GDP ( Gross Domestic Product).

Production

Today’s data opened with a flicker of positive news.

In November 2019, production in industry was up by 1.1% on the previous month on a price, seasonally and calendar adjusted basis according to provisional data of the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis). In October 2019, the corrected figure shows a decrease of 1.0% (primary -1.7%) from September 2019.

However this still meant this.

-2.6% on the same month a year earlier (price and calendar adjusted)

There is a particular significance in the upwards revision to October as some felt that the original numbers virtually guaranteed a contraction in GDP in the last quarter of 2019. In terms of a breakdown the better November figures relied on investment.

In November 2019, production in industry excluding energy and construction was up by 1.0%. Within industry, the production of capital goods increased by 2.4% and the production of consumer goods by 0.5%. The production of intermediate goods showed a decrease by 0.5%.

Only time will tell if the investment was wise. The orders data released yesterday was not especially hopeful.

Based on provisional data, the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) reports that price-adjusted new orders in manufacturing had decreased in November 2019 a seasonally and calendar adjusted 1.3% on the previous month.

Producing more into weaker orders has an obvious flaw and on an annual basis the situation was even worse.

-6.5% on the same month a year earlier (price and calendar adjusted)

Perhaps the investment was for the domestic economy as we look into the detail.

Domestic orders increased by 1.6% and foreign orders fell 3.1% in November 2019 on the previous month. New orders from the euro area were down 3.3%, new orders from other countries decreased 2.8% compared to October 2019.

But if we widen our outlook from Germany to the wider Euro area we see that it was the source of the strongest monthly slowing.

In a broad sweep orders for production rose from 2013 to December 2017 with the series peaking at 117.1 ( 2015=100) but we have been falling since and have now gone back to 2015 at 100.3.

The Labour Market

By contrast there is more to cheer from this area.

The euro area (EA19) seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate was 7.5% in November 2019, stable compared with
October 2019 and down from 7.9% in November 2018. This remains the lowest rate recorded in the euro area
since July 2008.

In terms of the broad trend the Euro area is now pretty much back to where it was before the credit crunch and is a long way from the peak of above 12% seen around 2013. But there are catches and nuances to this of which a major one is this.

In November 2019, the unemployment rate in the United States was 3.5%, down from 3.6% in October 2019 and
from 3.7% in November 2018.

That is quite a gap and whilst there may be issues around how the numbers are calculated that still leaves quite a gap. Also unemployment is a lagging indicator but it may be showing signs of turning.

Compared with October 2019, the number of persons unemployed increased by
34 000 in the EU28 and decreased by 10 000 in the euro area. Compared with November 2018, unemployment fell
by 768 000 in the EU28 and by 624 000 in the euro area.

The rate of decline has plainly slowed and if we look at Germany again we wait to see what the next move is.

Adjusted for seasonal and irregular effects, the number of unemployed remained unchanged from the previous month, standing at 1.36 million people as well. The adjusted unemployment rate was 3.1% in November, without any changes since May 2019.

Looking Ahead

There was some hope for 2020 reflected in the Markit PMI business surveys.

Business optimism about the year ahead has also improved
to its best since last May, suggesting the mood
among business has steadily improved in recent
months.

However the actual data was suggested a low base to start from.

Another month of subdued business activity in
December rounded off the eurozone’s worst quarter
since 2013. The PMI data suggest the euro area
will struggle to have grown by more than 0.1% in
the closing three months of 2019.

There is a nuance in that France continues to do better than Germany meaning that in their turf war France is in a relative ascendancy. In its monthly review the Italian statistics office has found some cheer for the year ahead.

The sectoral divide between falling industrial production and resilient turnover in services persists. However, business survey indicators convey first signals of optimism in manufacturing. Economic growth is projected to slightly increase its pace to moderate growth rates of 0.3% over the forecast horizon.

Comment

The problem for the ECB is that its monetary taps are pretty much fully open and money supply growth is fairly strong but as Markit puts it.

At face value, the weak performance is
disappointing given additional stimulus from the
ECB, with the drag from the ongoing plight of the
manufacturing sector a major concern.

It is having an impact but is not enough so far.

However, policymakers will be encouraged by the resilient
performance of the more domestically-focused
service sector, where growth accelerated in
December to its highest since August.

This brings us back to the opening theme of this year which has been central bankers both past and present singing along with the band Sweet.

Does anyone know the way, did we hear someone say
(We just haven’t got a clue what to do)
Does anyone know the way, there’s got to be a way
To blockbuster

Hence their move towards fiscal policy which is quite a cheek in the circumstances.

The conceptual issue is that all the intervention and central planning has left the Euro area struggling for any sustained economic growth and certainly slower growth than before. This is symbolised by Italy which remains a girlfriend in a coma.

The Composite Output Index* posted at 49.3 in December,
down from 49.6 in November, to signal a second consecutive fall in Italian private sector output. Moreover, the decline quickened to a marginal pace.