Odds of a recession appear low | Bob Doll

Sensible view from Bob Doll:

…The odds of a recession appear low, but so does a significant acceleration in growth. The regulatory environment is loosening, consumer spending appears solid and jobs growth remains strong. As such, we do not expect a recession any time soon. At the same time, however, we see no catalyst to push the economy into a higher gear unless the White House and Congress make progress on their pro-growth agenda.

Progress on tax reform would revive the bulls.

Source: Weekly Investment Commentary from Bob Doll | Nuveen

Murray has endorsed macroprudential | Macrobusiness.com.au

Posted by Houses and Holes
At 12:52pm on December 8, 2014
Published with permission from Macrobusiness.com.au.

From Callam Pickering:

The one glaring problem with the Financial System Inquiry is that it didn’t push hard for the introduction of macroprudential policies. That takes the heat off both the RBA and APRA.

The truth is that higher capital requirements — combined with higher risk weighting on mortgages and tax reform — would have a similar (potentially larger) effect as macroprudential policies. In the long term financial system and tax reform is clearly the better approach to creating an efficient and sustainable housing and financial sector, but these reforms will take longer to implement.

That’s right. Murray’s principle recommendations are macroprudential. APRA is now free (and is being urged) to implement higher capital requirements. They do not require anything from government to go ahead. This is basically the model of MP envisaged by Prof Ross Garnaut.

A more interesting question is whether or not APRA will still act on specific areas of risk such as interest-only loans. These are a menace, as the US bust showed, and are surging. Murray did not mention them, being too granular, but said the following on MP more particularly:

The global financial crisis (GFC) prompted policy makers and regulators around the world to reconsider their approach to maintaining financial stability. Some countries at the epicentre of the crisis have since expanded their prudential perimeters and adopted more formal and centralised institutional arrangements. This includes establishing single entities with responsibility for macro-prudential regulation. Australia has long adopted what could be called a ‘macro-prudential’ approach to supervision under the rubric of financial stability. Yet, Australia’s institutional structure is relatively informal and decentralised. The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) and APRA each have responsibility for financial stability. However, most macro-prudential tools can only be deployed by APRA. This places a strong premium on cooperation between the two agencies.

Against the background of developments overseas, the Inquiry has considered whether Australia should change its institutional arrangements for making and implementing financial stability policy.

However, the Inquiry does not see a strong case for change in this area. Although approach has advantages and disadvantages, alternative institutional approaches are yet to be tested — as indeed is the effectiveness of many macro-prudential tools. For this reason, the Inquiry recommends no fundamental change to the current institutional arrangements for financial stability policy and no change to the prudential perimeter at this time.

That is neither here nor there and APRA will still be free to raise capital requirements for specific loans if it sees fit.

Obama’s ‘Fairness’ Tax is Political, Not Fiscal

Eward Morrissey of the Fiscal Times points out the way toward resolving the fiscal cliff impasse:

Both parties want to reform the corporate and personal tax systems to eliminate complexity and provide stability and predictability. Rather than aim specifically at revenue, start by realizing the bipartisan goal of tax reform, which will boost investor confidence, and then address the spending that drives the deficits. That will be the only way to have a truly balanced long-term solution and a reliable increase in revenue, one that will keep America on a firm path to solvency…..

via Obama’s ‘Fairness’ Tax is Political, Not Fiscal.

Markets Worry About Fiscal Cliff

Michael S. Derby writes about the looming fiscal cliff:

The central problem is the lack of change. President Barack Obama was reelected. Democrats retained control of the Senate, while Republicans held on to the House of Representatives. The fiscal cliff can only be resolved if lawmakers work together. “Returning to status quo likely means all sides see the voters as supporting their views, which means reaching compromise is not likely to get any easier,” economists at Bank of America Merrill Lynch warned clients.

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio) says “the Republican majority in the House stands ready to work with [the President] to do what’s best for our country.” Republicans appear willing to accept additional tax revenues but their emphasis is on reforming entitlement programs and curbing “special interest loopholes and deductions”.

The Congressional Budget Office summarizes the fiscal cliff as:

Among the policy changes that are due to occur in January under current law, the following will have the largest impact on the budget and the economy:

  • A host of significant provisions of the Tax Relief, Unemployment Insurance Reauthorization, and Job Creation Act of 2010 (Public Law 111-312) are set to expire, including provisions that extended reductions in tax rates and expansions of tax credits and deductions originally enacted in 2001, 2003, or 2009. (Provisions designed to limit the reach of the alternative minimum tax, or AMT, expired on December 31, 2011.)
  • Sharp reductions in Medicare’s payment rates for physicians’ services are scheduled to take effect.
  • Automatic enforcement procedures established by the Budget Control Act of 2011 to restrain discretionary and mandatory spending are set to go into effect.
  • Extensions of emergency unemployment benefits and a reduction of 2 percentage points in the payroll tax for Social Security are scheduled to expire.

The CBO estimates that increases in federal taxes and reductions in federal spending, totaling almost
$500 billion, will cause a 0.5 percent drop in GDP in 2013.