The U.S. economy is displaying signs of weakness, but it isn't as distressing as it was one month ago. That was the message of DoubleLine’s CEO Jeffrey Gundlach yesterday on a webcast with clients.
In a wide-raging talk entitled "The Greatest Economy Ever," Gundlach repeated his prediction that the odds for a 2020 recession were 75% and suggested again that President Trump might not seek re-election. Politicians might enjoy the ensuing free-for-all, but that "would create a chaotic situation."
The outspoken bond fund manager gained some notoriety as an amateur political pundit in 2016 when he predicted the election of President Trump at a time few others were.
"It isn't close to the greatest economy ever," Gundlach said. That said, there has never been a recession without leading economic indicators going negative, and so far they've remained in positive territory.
On a global level, one positive sign is that over the last few weeks several trillion in global debt has gone from negative to positive yields. Gundlach believe that Treasury yields put in their lows for the year in mid-August..
But foreign economies like Germany have been weakening at a faster rate than the U.S., and both consumer confidence and business climate indices are down in many countries.
Recently, Gundlach traveled to Japan and asked the manager of that nation's largest pension fund if he or anyone he knew was buying bonds at negative rates. The pension fund manager laughed and told Gundlach the only real buyer was the central bank.
Global trade is being influenced by the trade war, which is one reason the South Korean stock market is down more than 20% since it peaked in early 2018. Ironically, that market was one of the biggest winners following Trump's election. "consumers are alwsy the last one to get the joke," he added.
Then Gundlach turned to one of his favorite charts—global stock indices.
The Japanese market set its all-time high in 1989 and never got that high again. European stocks peaked at the turn of the millennium and have never regained their highs either. Emerging markets peaked in 2008.