Rising yields on the 10-year U.S. treasury bond, now brushing up against 5 percent, will eventually crimp consumer spending and slow the economy, Jonathan Gray, president of Blackstone Group, the world’s largest asset manager, said last week in a Financial Times interview.
The Conference Board’s Leading Economic Index, which tracks business cycles, fell 0.7 percent to 104.7 in September, its 18th month in a row showing declining economic activity.
Uncertainty about whether the U.S. Congress will raise the debt limit has helped push bond prices to multi-decade lows and given the U.S. Federal Reserve second thoughts about raising interest rates again when it meets next week, Bloomberg reported.
In the U.S. government’s current fiscal year, the annual budget deficit roughly doubled to $2 trillion, even though the treasury reported the shortfall as $1.7 trillion, The New York Times reported.
Where are the global economies and equity markets going?
They, as well as the lives of billions, are going to Hell, right in front of the eyes and ears of all who have the courage and dedication to watch, look, and listen.
As we have noted since the Central Banksters started to rapidly raise interest rates, the decade’s long merger and acquisition spree is over. However, the “Bigs” will still get bigger, as they buy out overleveraged companies that can’t afford to borrow at high rates to refinance while, at the same time, recessionary pressures erode their profitability.
Dick’s Sporting Goods and Macy’s are two of many major retailers hiring fewer seasonal workers this year, indicating a gloomy outlook for what traditionally is retailers’ make-or-break selling period.
Although the U.S. economy added a startling 336,000 jobs last month, most of the gains were in just three sectors: government, health care, and leisure and hospitality, according to labor department figures.
Corporate bankruptcies are increasing, as we noted in “Corporate Bankruptcies Could Reach 13-Year High” (26 Sep 2023). Even more worrying, a larger number of very big businesses are going bust.
Last week, the mortgage interest rate for a 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage averaged 7.57 percent, according to the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corp. (Freddie Mac), up from 7.49 percent the week before.