LAST WEEK

News & Commentary Weekly Highlights:

• Wall Street Journal: OECD Sounds Alarm Over Slowdown in Economic Overhauls (Thursday)
• Market Watch: Fed Deserves Some Blame for Market Selloff: Bullard (Thursday)
• The Fiscal Times: Obamacare Is Wide Open to Fraud—and They’re Not Going to Fix It (Thursday)
• Market Watch: Prospect of a Global ‘Recession’ Is Getting Stronger, Says Citi (Thursday)
• Bloomberg Business: The World’s Debt Is Alarmingly High. But is It Contagious? (Monday)

 

Top Economic Indicator Highlights:

Gross Domestic Product (second estimate, Q4-2015)

• Real GDP Quarterly Change (annual rate): 1.0%, Previous quarter: 2.0%, Recovery avg.: 2.1%
• Noteworthy: Real GDP growth was revised up to a still-unimpressive 1.0% in the second estimate from 0.7% in the first estimate for the fourth quarter of 2015. Private inventory investment decreased less than previously estimated. The increase in real GDP reflects positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures, residential fixed investment, and federal government spending that was partly offset by negative contributions from exports, nonresidential fixed investment, state and local government spending, and private inventory investment. The third and final estimate of GDP for the fourth quarter of 2015 will be released on March 25^th.
• Current Forecasts for Q1-2016: Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow forecasts first quarter real GDP growth at 2.1%. Wells Fargo’s current first quarter 2016 forecast for annualized real GDP growth is 1.0%.

 

THIS WEEK

Upcoming Economic Reports & Releases:

Major Indicators

• Pending Home Sales Index (10am, Monday)
• Motor Vehicle Sales (Tuesday)
• Institute for Supply Management Manufacturing Index (10am, Tuesday)
• Construction Spending (10am, Tuesday)
• Productivity & Costs (8:30am, Thursday)
• Factory Orders (10am, Thursday)
• Institute for Supply Management Non-Manufacturing Index (10am, Thursday)
• International Trade (8:30am, Friday)
• Employment Situation (8:30am, Friday)

 

Reports & Hearings

• Beige Book (2pm, Wednesday)
• CEA Chairman Jason Furman testifies before the Joint Economic Committee (2:30pm, Wednesday)

 

Chart of the Week:

 

 

Slow monthly payroll job growth expected ahead. The chart above shows the average monthly payroll job growth, by quarter from the first quarter of 2016 through the final quarter of 2026, based on the CBO’s latest economic projections from the January update to the Budget and Economic Outlook: 2016 to 2026. Notably, the projected average nonfarm payroll job growth declines significantly from near 200,000 jobs per month in the first quarter of 2016 to a brief dip just above 50,000 jobs per month during 2019 and 2020 before ultimately settling at an average of approximately 75,000 jobs projected per month by the end of the decade.