Global Business Sentiment Is Back to Pre-Recession Levels

By Doug Short: The Advance Retail Sales Report released Wednesday morning shows that sales in February came in at 1.1% month-over-month. Yesterday's number more than doubled the Briefing.com consensus forecast of 0.5%. The expiration of the 2% FICA tax cut contributed to weak January sales, but February has come roaring back. Now let's dig a bit deeper into the "real" data, adjusted for inflation and against the backdrop of our growing population.

By Doug Short: The Advance Retail Sales Report released Wednesday morning shows that sales in February came in at 1.1% month-over-month. Yesterday's number more than doubled the Briefing.com consensus forecast of 0.5%. The expiration of the 2% FICA tax cut contributed to weak January sales, but February has come roaring back. Now let's dig a bit deeper into the "real" data, adjusted for inflation and against the backdrop of our growing population.

Some people use the end of December as an opportunity for a retrospective on the year. But I decided to take a look back at the last three years, by way of updating some comparisons I made in April 2009 between the Great Recession and the average characteristics of other postwar recessions.

Forget about probabilities and statistics and measures of so-called leading indicators (such as the stock market which does not lead), and the yield curve that is useless when zero-bound. Instead, simply focus on data from around the globe, especially new orders. Markit reports Global economic growth eases to near-stagnation in June

Japanese business confidence has improved for a sixth straight quarter but companies are looking ahead with caution amid global economic uncertainty, the Bank of Japan said Wednesday.The index of sentiment among major manufacturers in the central bank's quarterly survey rose to eight in September from one in June, according to the central bank's closely watched Tankan survey of more than 11,000 firms.The figure beat expectations of a reading of six.