On October 30, 2017, we said the following of the Industrial Production Index:
“As each peak is exceeded, we’d expect that the prospects for a recession will be pushed out longer in time (though not necessarily a good thing for the economy, it gives time to prepare for the next recession).
“On the whole, we expect that the trend is in fact our friend and therefore believe that the February 2018 date would be a reasonable expected date for a recession, until proven otherwise.”
Any half decent analysis suggests that we change our tune with the actual conditions of the market. After all, we were wrong about the first two of four expected dates for a recession. In this case, the February 2018 and May 2019 expected recession dates have come and gone. This leave the last two of four (“average” and “longest”) expected dates for recession remaining, based on the historical data from 1920 to the present. Continue reading