The Lombard Review

Economy

The Federal Reserve, inflation, jobs and growth: analysis of the economic cycle and the data behind it.

Economy

What the Fed's forecasts really say

Distributional reading of SEP

Economy

The Fed wants to pause without looking soft

Pause while signalling further hikes

Economy

The jobs report that disagrees with itself, again

Survey divergence returns

Personal Finance

Nobody can agree how much savings Americans have left

Trend-choice sensitivity of savings estimates

Economy

Why core inflation stopped falling

Services persistence halts disinflation

Economy

Is this the Fed's last hike?

Statement language as policy signal

Economy

Tighter loans today, more defaults tomorrow

SLOOS leads charge-offs ~2 quarters

World

China is spending again. Its property market isn't

Consumption rebound absent credit impulse

Economy

Watching deposits leave in real time

Weekly deposit data as lending signal

Economy

OPEC just made the Fed's job harder

Energy shock re-anchors headline inflation

Economy

Are bank failures doing the Fed's job for it?

Credit contraction substitutes for tightening

Markets & Finance

The Fed's quiet bailout of banks' bad bond bets

Par collateral valuation removes fire-sale loss

Economy

Powell signals bigger hikes are back

Testimony reprices step-size

Economy

When the data changes after the decision

Revisions distort rule-implied rate

Economy

Did shoppers really spend 3% more in January?

January seasonal adjustment inflates spending

Special Report

Valentine's Day: Markets still love rate cuts. The Fed doesn't love them back

Markets price cuts Fed won't deliver

Economy

Last year's inflation just got rewritten

Factor revisions shift inflation timing

Economy

517,000 jobs and the end of the rate-cut dream

Labour tightness forces terminal repricing

Tech

Meta's new growth story: buying back its own shares

Capital return re-rates cost-cut narrative

Economy

The economy grew 2.9%. Demand barely grew at all

Inventory and trade noise mask weak demand

Economy

The inflation number the Fed secretly cares about

Services ex-housing predictive power

Business

Tech's layoffs are really about profits

Opex cuts replace growth capex

Special Report

New Year: Everyone expects a recession. That's the warning sign

Crowded forecasts underperform

Economy

Is the recession alarm broken?

Term-spread models under QE-distorted curves

Economy

How long can shoppers keep spending their pandemic savings?

Consumption cushion drawdown rate

Economy

The Fed and the market disagree. Someone is wrong

Market-implied path vs SEP median

Economy

Goods are getting cheaper. Services aren't

Core goods deflation offsets services

Economy

Wages are rising — by how much depends on who you ask

Composition bias across wage measures

Economy

China reopens, and the world gets a new inflation problem

Commodity demand rebound vs goods disinflation

Special Report

Cyber Monday: What the discounts say about inflation

Online price indices lead CPI goods

Markets & Finance

The bond market is screaming recession

Curve prices policy error, not growth

Economy

Rents are already falling. Official data hasn't noticed

New-lease indices lead CPI rent ~12 months

Economy

One good inflation report does not make a trend

Single-month relief vs persistence of core

Economy

$2trn is sitting at the Fed doing nothing

MMF cash parked at Fed drains private liquidity

Economy

The jobs report that contradicts itself

Survey methodology gap in employment signal

Economy

Why slowing down could mean the Fed goes higher

Step-down in pace trades against longer hold

Economy

Two jobs reports, two stories. Which one matters?

Vacancy-unemployment ratio vs payroll momentum

Economy

Nineteen Fed officials, nineteen different futures

Dot dispersion as policy-uncertainty proxy

Economy

The inflation the Fed can't fix: your haircut and your dentist

Labour-intensive services track wage growth

Economy

Don't bet on inflation falling just because the maths says so

YoY vs 3m-annualised CPI divergence misleads

Economy

The Fed has found its cheapest weapon: going big early

Front-loaded hikes cut cumulative tightening via expectations