For the past few years, Wall Street has been saying U.S. growth is accelerating. That's been wrong. While no one (not even big bank chief economists) are calling for 3% to 4% GDP growth anymore, it would appear that the U.S. economy is finally picking up.
In the Chart of the Day below, check out our GDP estimates (on a year-over-year basis) versus Wall Street consensus. As you can see, the U.S. economy may close out the year near 2%, an acceleration from the low of 1.3% in the second quarter of 2016 and a far cry from 3.3% hit in early 2015.
This is why, in 2014, we said buy Long Bonds (TLT) as U.S. growth slowed. Now, with the U.S. growth accelerating, we told subscribers to sell Long Bonds and buy U.S. equities. Yesterday's Industrial Production and Retail Sales data confirmed our #GrowthAccelerating pivot, despite the media's resounding misinterpretation of the data.
This is what distinguishes us from Wall Street. We don't call for 4% growth when the data clearly doesn't support it. We measure and map the data.
(Click here to learn more about how we model the U.S. economy.)
