2012

Debt deflation is taking hold in Europe. We have seen the crash in Greece's economy unfold over the last two years. And now we are witnessing similar things in Spain. As Marshall Auerback puts it, Spain is the New Greece. But now come signs…

Here's a second batch of links. I think the Bloomberg piece on Spanish banks is a big highlight here. Essentially, Bloomberg tells us that Spain may be overestimating bank profits and therefore underestimating the capital shortfall of its…

I have a ton of links so I am going to break them up into groups. Here's the first bunch from late last week. Three topics are most interesting.

Much like the US manufacturing index, the global manufacturing index has hit three year lows. The numbers indicate a contraction in global manufacturing activity, with the JPMorgan Global Manufacturing PMI now below 50% at 48.9% for June…

The Institute for Supply Management released its widely-followed index of manufacturing activity today. The data show that the US manufacturing sector contracted in June for the first time since July 2009. Given economic weakness elsewhere…

Comstock Partners argues that slowing growth as well as deficit and debt problems in the Eurozone, U.S., China and the emerging nations increases the odds of a deflationary global recession and a renewed down leg in the ongoing secular bear…

Research in Motion, the Canadian company that makes Blackberry handsets has just turned in an abysmal quarter's earnings. Across the board, from the top line, to operating earnings, to the bottom line, and to unit sales, results were poor.…

Earlier in the year, I predicted that corporate profitability would fall as US corporate profit margins were cyclically high. The New York Times is reporting that corporate profits fell in Q1 2012 for the first time since the fourth quarter…

This week's newsletter will focus on Europe again as this morning the European summit has produced significant changes in European economic policy. Spanish Prime Minister Rajoy and Italian Prime Minister Monti threatened to 'block…

The latest economic data suggest that the slowdown in growth continues to build across many different economies globally. In the UK, revised data from Q4 2011 show that Britain;s recession has been deeper than was previously…