Let's start by just looking at market action. After nearly a decade of underperformance US financials are showing relative strength. They are indeed cheap on a book basis. But can there be any visibility into earnings growth? Could the end of the Obama years lead to better banking futures? The bank index is now testing multi year highs and happened to be up big in yesterdays massive rally.
Here you have the Dow Jones Transportation index.As you can imagine, this is a very cyclical index and is a forward leaning indicator. As goods and people are transported, ecomomic growth moves along with it.
Here is a reinforcing datapoint. This shows US Air traffic. Clearly lots of strength here. As both a consumer discretionary item and a business necessity, when this is showing strength,it requires underlying strength of the economy.
As we know, job are a requirement for any economic strength. Today's JOTLS data further supports ongoing strength. JOLTS is a measure of Jobs Open or companies looking to hire.
Now, let's look towards commodity sectors. Copper, which is one of the most sensitive commodities to economic growth, especially of the industrial type is surging:
Mortgages are our largest personal debt. As delinquencies rise, it is clear evidence of a weakening economy. Here, delinquencies are near cycle lows.
Anyway, as voters go to the polls today to elect our 45th US President.It is likely that volatility will ensue. We just wanted to point out a few salient economic datapoints to provide perspective on just "how things are going" in the economy. We will have more High frequency data points and insight in coming days.
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