capital investment

I have been off since Thursday due to the Easter holiday. But I want to write my traditional Friday post today with a grab bag of different issues I am seeing. I actually just want to focus on the US this time.

I have been saying for some time now that I believe peak growth in this US business cycle was Q3 2013. Nevertheless, I want to explore the possibility that growth will accelerate from here, something that could keep stock prices and other…

Sober Look's received a number of e-mails regarding the recent post on the possibility that rising CAPEX spending in the US is driving corporations to tap their credit facilities, thus increasing loan growth. Most were highly critical of…

No one has denied that China was overdue for a credit shakeout due to the Chinese government’s desire to stem excess credit growth as the economy rebalances. The question has always been about how much of a shakeout Chinese policy makers…

This is a loaded topic. This entry, however, is not intended to be political. Very few things in economics are good or bad in themselves, but rather can be good under certain conditions or bad under others. I want to try to tease out as…

Sanctions because of the Crimean crisis have had less economic impact than private portfolio preference shifts. However, as Ukraine moves into the EU sphere, further actions against Ukraine could be more far-reaching. China has moved…

Marc Faber appeared on Bloomberg Television yesterday to discuss the Chinese economy. While Faber generally seems to be a long-term bull on China, he had some disquieting things to say about the extent of malinvestment in China due to the…

Credit growth in the US seems to have stabilized and may be on the rise. It's worth mentioning that the bottom in loan growth just happened to correspond to the start of Fed's taper. Coincidence? Maybe. But why is corporate America…

As a confirmation of a significant downward adjustment to China's growth, a battery of economic reports yesterday morning all came in materially below expectations.

Steel, iron ore futures in China tanked on bloated (all-time high) inventories and apparent lending curbs by Chinese banks.