In this briefing:
- Thailand: The Sandbox
- 2019 U.S. Growth and Employment Outlook
- A Reality Check of the U.S. Economic Data Amid Market Volatility
- Preview: UK Disinflation Again in Nov-18
1. Thailand: The Sandbox
In Insight, Thailand GDP – Headline Numbers Suggest a Much Weaker Economy, we wrote that we see Thailand doing well despite the headline numbers hiding much of what the country’s has going for it. Along with its plans for the Eastern Economic Corridor and the spillover benefits from its strong-growing neighbours – Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam – prospects for 2019 look rosy. Even more interesting is the rapprochement between China and Japan and their attitude towards investments in Thailand. The hub of Asia may be about to come alive.
2. 2019 U.S. Growth and Employment Outlook
- In 2018, the U.S. economy experienced aggregate demand outstripping aggregate supply and output growth exceeding potential. We expect the same themes to hold in 2019 with real GDP growth at 2.7% and the unemployment rate falling to 3.3%.
- We expect aggregate demand growth to be led by a pickup in investment spending as the benefits of the December 2017 tax cut continue to filter through and as we look for some resolution on trade and tariff issues between the U.S. and China.
- There is evidence that the potential growth rate of the economy is rising but we still see 2.7% growth as being faster than potential, which we currently put at 2.1%. In addition to a continued decline in unemployment in 2019 we look for a rising real trade deficit.
- For 2020, we see real GDP growth at 2.4% and the unemployment rate drifting lower to 3.1%.
3. A Reality Check of the U.S. Economic Data Amid Market Volatility
With the continued gyrations in the equity market and the drop in bond yields, we thought it would be worthwhile to do a quick scrub of the latest news on the U.S. economy to provide a crosscheck on the message from markets.
4. Preview: UK Disinflation Again in Nov-18
- UK CPI inflation has been biased to disappoint expectations this year, and I am marginally below Consensus for the upcoming Nov-18 at 2.24% y-o-y.
- Recreation and transport prices subtract the most from my projections, but food price judgements were the overlaid assessment that triggered my forecasts to round down recently. Observed changes in about 12,000 prices drove this decision.
