More, Better, Now: "Get Your [Economic] Indicators" - Mostly Okay Except for those Pesky Mortgage Delinquencies

Our friend and former colleague, John, authors a first-rate blog focused on marketing called more better now - Going, doing, making things happen (& etc.). We recommend giving a look as he shares a number of great images, ideas, strategies, and commentary.

On 5/26, in Get Your Indicators, John relayed a snapshot of a helpful visualization from Russell Investments of key economic and market indicators. We include this graphic for reference here:

Despite persistent and potentially mounting economic worries in the Market, nearly all indicators are tracking in the normal range (for what normal is worth). The one indicator that is an extreme outlier from the "typical" range is mortgage deliquencies, which isn't a huge surprise given the size of the recent real estate debacle (thank you easy money and all facilitators, including main street). Drilling further on the Russell chart, we quickly and vividly see just how much of a problem real estate remains for the U.S. economy:

Suffice to say that real estate will remain a drag as the economy languishes forward, with prices likely under pressure as supply continues to exceed demand. Fortunately, we see stabilization and pockets of strength in other areas. As a side note on this topic, we are way, way overdue in updating our "How's the Economy Doing" series. Soon.

Thanks to John for bringing the Russell visualization to our attention.

Happy investing,

Jeffrey Walkenhorst
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