Unemployment

We are a long way from really resolving the argument between the Keynesian and Austrian economic theories, despite some so-called experts proclaiming Krugman's victory this week. The discovery of the calculation error in the Reinhart/Rogoff study does little to change the overall premise that excessive debt levels impede economic growth and have, historically, led to the fall of economic empires.  All one really has to do is pick up a history book and read of the Greeks, Romans, British, French, Russians and many others. Does fiscal responsibility lead to short term economic pain?  Absolutely.  Why would anyone ever imagine that cutting spending and reducing budgets would be pain free?  However, what we do know is that the path of fiscal irresponsibility has long term negative consequences for the economy. In the meantime we can continue to ignore the long term conseqences in exchange for short term bliss.

Youth unemployment has become a worrying phenomenon with 74.6 million young people unemployed globally in 2012. Rising youth unemployment has a detrimental effect on economic growth, political and social stability as well as on the ability to exploit the potential demographic dividend. Young people who are neither in employment nor in education or training (NEET) are a particular social concern. The economic and social impact of a growing number of NEET young people aged 15 - 24 has raised concerns as they represent a dead weight burden.

The world is heading into a horrific economic nightmare, and an inordinate amount of the suffering is going to fall on innocent children.  If you want to get an idea of what America is going to look like in the not too distant future, just check out what is happening in Greece.  At this point, Greece is experiencing a full-blown economic depression. And as you will read about below, child hunger is absolutely exploding in Greece right now.  Some families are literally trying to survive on pasta and ketchup.  But don't think for a moment that it can't happen here.Sadly, the truth is that child hunger is already rising very rapidly in our poverty-stricken cities.  Never before have we had so many Americans unable to take care of themselves. Unfortunately, more poor families slip through the cracks with each passing day, and these are supposedly times in which we are experiencing an "economic recovery".  So what are things going to look like when the next major economic downturn strikes?

It is balmy, spring weather outside: the kind of weather one can't blame NFP, GDP, retail sales or German ZEW misses on. Which means Europe's protest season is now officially open. Courtesy of El Pais, we present this live feed of today's protest from Spain, where as reported previously, youth unemployment is now over 57% (which is good news as there is only 43% before youth unemployment can only improve) so the majority of those 25 and under really have nothing better to do than throw stones at the riot police, and vice versa. For now the protest is largely languid, as it is still siesta time. Once night falls, however, we expect to upgrade the protestcam to riotcam, outlook escalating.

The EuroStoxx 600 - one of Europe's broadest equity index - is up almost 5% in the last 5 days, the best such run since July of last year and is trading close to levels not seen since June 2008. Of course it is we hear you scream, Spanish unemployment is worst and getting worster, the core economy (Germany) is fading rapidly, Italian growth forecasts are being slashed, Europe's growth forecasts are being significantly lowered; have no fear Draghi is here (with what? we implore?). While stocks in Europe were off to the races once again, for the second day in a row, Spanish and Italian bond spreads leaked wider (after their record-breaking run recently). EURUSD also took a big stumble today, from around 1.31 to below 1.30 on Goldman's note on ECB's albeit 'cosmetic' rate cut.

In yet another worse-than-expected macro data point, Spain has just breached the 27% unemployment level - the highest since at least 1976, when data began following dictator Francisco Franco's death. At 27.2% this is already higher than the IMF's year-end estimate of 27% suggesting growth estimates are already overly optimistic. What is more concerning is the rate of increase in the joblessness is rising once again. The 1.1 percentage point rise is the largest in a year and 177,700 more households now have no actively employed members than a year ago. The greatest fear though, for European leaders and the Spanish people themselves, is the surge in youth unemployment. As we have noted a number of times in the past, the possibility of social unrest is exaggerated significantly by this number and at an incredulous 57.2% of under-25s out of work, Spain is closing in on Greece, according to official data, for the worst youth unemployment situation in Europe.

Any hopes that the S&P would hit a new all time high on horrible initial claims data may have been dashed following a report that initial claims for unemployment insurance dropped from an upward revised 355K (was 352K) to 339K, better than the expected 350K, and down to a nearly fresh five year low. It was unclear immediately following the report which states were estimated if any: as a reminder last week the DOL announced that 2 states had their data estimated. Continuing claims dropped from an upward revised 3093K to 3000K, the lowest in 5 years. Of course, with millions of people now prematurely out of the labor participation rate, what if any data the initial claims report provides these days, is very much unclear.

A peculiar trading session, in which the usual overnight futures levitation has not been led by the BOJ-inspired USDJPY rise (even as the Nikkei225 rose another 0.6% more than offset by the Shanghai Composite drop of 0.86%), which actually has slid all session briefly dipping under 99 moments ago, but by the EURUSD, which saw a bout of buying around 5 am Eastern, just after news hit that the UK would avoid a triple dip recession with Q1 GDP rising 0.3% versus expectations of a 0.1% rise, up from a -0.3% in Q4 (more in Goldman note below). Since the news that the BOE will likely delay engaging in more QE (just in time for the arrival of Carney) is hardly EUR positive we look at the other news hitting around that time, such as Finland saying that the euro can survive in Cyprus exits the Eurozone, and that Merkel has rejected standardized bank guarantees for the foreseeable future, and we are left scratching our heads what is the reason for the brief burst in the Euro.

What is happening to you America?  Once upon a time, the United States was a place where free enterprise thrived and the greatest cities that the world had ever seen sprouted up from coast to coast.  Good jobs were plentiful and a manufacturing boom helped fuel the rise of the largest and most vibrant middle class in the history of the planet.  Cities such as Detroit, Chicago, Milwaukee, Cleveland, Philadelphia and Baltimore were all teeming with economic activity and the rest of the globe looked on our economic miracle with a mixture of wonder and envy.  But now look at us.  Our once proud cities are being transformed into poverty-stricken hellholes. We are in the midst of a long-term economic collapse that is eating away at us like cancer, and things are going to get a lot worse than this.  So if you still live in a prosperous area of the country, don't laugh at what is happening to others.  What is happening to them will be coming to your area soon enough.

The implications of the latest political developments in Italy.

When it comes to Italy, the market may have priced in every possible favorable outcome (the ECB and Kuroda will take care of the rest), but the country still has no Prime Minister and its economy continues to be in freefall with record unemployment and ever higher bank non-performing loans month after month. And while it may have elected a new figurehead president after 6 attempts last week, the choice of Prime Minister will hardly be as simple, especially since as the WSJ reports, this will likely be Enrico Letta, deputy of the Democratic Party (which as a reminder is in complete chaos following last week's internal coup and the resignation of its head Bersani over the weekend), at a time when Berlusconi's PDL lead in the polls continues to increase. Why the Bunga veteran would agree to a premiership by his opponents remains unclear, and with a parliamentary vote coming, it is doubtful just how smooth the approval process will be in a country best known for its dysfunctioning political process.

The resilience of the euro and Australian dollar today, given the heightened rate cut speculation, may be indicative of a reversal of the US dollar's recent fortunes.

Despite rising (and record) unemployment, non-performing loans at record levels crushing the banking system's balance sheets, pension funds all-in, and their Italian neighbor now expecting more budget cuts of almost 1% of GDP in 2015-17 (and further downside risks to the GDP forecasts); Italian and Spanish bond spreads are pressing below critically 'positive' levels. While Italy remains above recent low spreads, Spain has just breached the 300bps (spread to Bunds) level; last seen in November 2011. The last 3 days have been the best run in Spanish bonds for six months. This level has been significant resistance a number of times since the European crisis began, but this time it's different, since the BoJ is seemingly blind to 'risk' and only sees 'return'. With the market telling the politicians that Europe is fixed, is it any wonder they are all asking for a stop to austerity? Or is bad once again good, as it forces Draghi's hand to follow his BoE, BoJ, Fed compatriots down the rabbit hole?

The commodity market is saying global growth is slowing. But, there is hope, as BofAML's David Woo notes, the US equity market is saying US consumers are still going strong; and the FX and European sovereign markets seem to believe Mrs. Watanabe is about to embark on a global shopping spree. However, like us, Woo thinks it is unlikely that these markets will all turn out to be right. At the same time, we agree completely with Woo's assessment that markets may be under pricing three macro risks: the ability of Beijing to ease policy aggressively in the face of strong home price appreciation may be limited; the positive wealth effect of US housing recovery may not be enough to offset the contractionary impact of fiscal tightening; Japanese money may stay at home longer than expected. As he concludes, "something will have to give and a major re-alignment of the markets, the odds of which are rising, will probably not be either smooth or benign."

Often times, for the best, closest to the ground perspective on economic opportunities in any given economy, there is hardly any more convincing metric than observing the level of net migration of foreigners into a country, and subsequently out. First, it was Italy, where net immigrants from Afghanistan and Bangladesh came, they saw, and promptly took the first boat back to whereever it was they came from. Then, a year ago we first showed that the endless media propaganda has little to no impact on the marginal cheap worker in the US, as Mexican immigrants finally became emigrants after realizing that real demand for their services, even as bargain basement wages, simply does not exist. And now, it was only logical that Europe's economic basket case with unemployment levels so high one literally needs bigger charts, was the next to follow. As BBC reports, in 2012 the Spanish population of 47.3 million declined by some 206,000 as "immigrants left the country amid a major economic crisis." The actual population change consisted of native Spaniards growing by a token 10,000 more than offset by the 216,000 registered foreign residents who decided to just pack it up and go back, mostly from Ecuador and Colombia. One could say they threw in the proverbial (Spiderman) towel, or at least sold it on Ebay.