So much for the great American CapEx recovery. Moments ago the Census department released the March Durable Goods [4] report, thanks to which one can lay to rest any hope of a recovery in the US economy, with the headline number printing an absolutely abysmal -5.7%, an epic swing from the +5.7% (revised lower of course to 4.3%) in February, and confirming the recovery is dead and buried. This was the biggest miss in headline data and the biggest drop since August, and the second worst since January 2009.
[5]
Although we are confident the propaganda spin is just waiting to be unleashed: after all it is possible that March weather was both too hot and too cold, thereby making the number completely irrelevant - after all it is always the inclement weather's fault when the economy does not act as predicted by some economist's DSGE model of reality and stuff.
This headline number was obviously a huge miss to expectations of -3%, with the misses spreading to all sub headline categories too: Durables ex-transportation was down -1.4%, on expectations of a 0.5% rise, (previous revised from -0.5% to -1.7%). And so much for CapEx with Cap Goods nondefense ex aircraft up just 0.2% (0.3% exp) with the previous revised from -2.7% to -4.8%, while the nondefense orders shipped ex air missed expectations of a 0.8% rise, printing at 0.3%, and the February data revised from 1.9% to 1.2%. In brief, horrifying economic data however one looks at it, and proof that the great CapEx recovery never existed to begin with. So much for 3% Q1 GDP, which is about to be revised by everyone lower across the board.
Finally, if this economic collapse validation doesn't send the S&P limit up, nothing will.
The only two charts needed to show what is really going on in terms of capex and generally spending on core capex:
Orders:
[6]
Shipments:
[7]