Italian retail sales ticked higher in February, rising by 0.1% after a 0.6% January gain. Still, retail performance is poor with nominal sales up by less than 1% over 12 months (0.9%) and dead flat over both six months and three [...]
Introducing
Robert Brusca
in:Our Authors
Robert A. Brusca is Chief Economist of Fact and Opinion Economics, a consulting firm he founded in Manhattan. He has been an economist on Wall Street for over 25 years. He has visited central banking and large institutional clients in over 30 countries in his career as an economist. Mr. Brusca was a Divisional Research Chief at the Federal Reserve Bank of NY (Chief of the International Financial markets Division), a Fed Watcher at Irving Trust and Chief Economist at Nikko Securities International. He is widely quoted and appears in various media. Mr. Brusca holds an MA and Ph.D. in economics from Michigan State University and a BA in Economics from the University of Michigan. His research pursues his strong interests in non aligned policy economics as well as international economics. FAO Economics’ research targets investors to assist them in making better investment decisions in stocks, bonds and in a variety of international assets. The company does not manage money and has no conflicts in giving economic advice.
Publications by Robert Brusca
Global| Apr 09 2019Italian Retail Sales Tick Higher
- Global| Apr 08 2019
OECD LEIs Flash Slowdown!
The OECD leading indicators are barometers of economic activity; they are available for a broad set of countries. These indicators show declining LEI values on a broad array of countries and regions with a time series of weakness in [...]
- Global| Apr 05 2019
German IP Makes Solid Gain But Manufacturing IP Still Falls; Negative Momentum Is Blunted Largely by Capital Goods [...]
The February German report on industrial production shows a 0.7% gain after a flat result in January that has been revised up from a decline previously. The industrial sector is mixed. The headline shows a 5.9% annual rate of increase [...]
- Global| Apr 04 2019
German Orders Continue to Flesh-Out the Weak Side of the Story; Extremely Weak Foreign Orders Drive Weakness
The chart of year-on-year growth rates pretty much tells the story. Domestic orders in Germany have been weak and declining since early in 2018. The pace of their erosion has been both steady and relentless. But foreign order growth [...]
- Global| Apr 03 2019
Global PMIs Show Some Life in the Services Sector Versus Near-Death in Manufacturing and Purgatory from Brexit
The composite PMI readings largely lost ground in March, however, not by much in most cases. Italy Spain and China are exceptions where the composite PMIs gained traction. In four of eight of the countries/regions whose results are [...]
- Global| Apr 02 2019
PPI Continues to Show Mild Growth
News headlines on this report say that the PPI in the EMU accelerated in February. Do not believe it. I have long had my quibbles with how journalists describe economic reports. Today’s PPI report is an example. The headline PPI [...]
- Global| Apr 01 2019
China's Manufacturing PMI Rebounds to Register Growth
Global markets cheered as China's manufacturing PMI registered positive growth in March for the first time since October of last year. Still, the reading is weak and a bare-bones positive at 50.5. Ranking the headline diffusion index [...]
- Global| Mar 29 2019
German Sales Rebound in the Context of a Slowing Trend and Global Malaise
Germany's retail sales unexpectedly rose sharply in February after a solid rebound in January. Year-over-year retail sales rise by 5.5% and they are rising at a 7.7% annual rate in the quarter-to-date. Real retail sales also have a [...]
- Global| Mar 28 2019
EMU Indexes –Still at Solid Levels- Slip Again
The EU Commission Index for the EMU fell to a steeper-than-expected 105.5 in March from 106.2 in February. The fall takes the headline index down to a 69.9 percentile queue standing among its historic results, a moderate but firm [...]
- Global| Mar 27 2019
Canada Posts Second Largest Trade Deficit Ever
The stalactites on the chart tell a tale of Canada flirting with some very large deficits for some time, through 2016 and into 2017. After a short hiatus, the deficit erosion seems to be back. While exports and imports both rose in [...]
- Global| Mar 26 2019
Germany's Consumer Confidence Is Set to Slip
The GfK German consumer confidence reading is lower in April at a level of 10.4, down from 10.7 in March. The drop marks the second monthly drop in a row. The level of the reading in April is the weakest since December 2018. GfK is a [...]
- Global| Mar 25 2019
IFO Gain Turns Bund Yield Positive But It Won't Turn Lead Into Gold
The IFO diffusion index for March is unchanged. But the current conditions index rose to 29 from 27.3 while the expectations index slid to -9.8 from -8.5. And that mixed and thin gruel was enough for markets to boost the 10-year bund [...]
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