Labor Day: Celebrate Wall Street!

Desperate for daylight at the end of a seemingly endless tunnel, investors took heart from the latest jobs report. The Dow climbed nearly 128 points on the Sept. 3 news that hiring seems to be getting back in style, at least in parts of the economy. But banks, hedge funds and other financial players on and off Wall Street seem not to have gotten the word. They’re still stumbling in the dark when it comes to adding staff.

Even while scattered reports of modest additions pop up in the daily press, there’s little evidence that the sun will shine soon on the financial sector. Nationally, the number of people working in financial services barely budged in August, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Counting both finance and insurance, the tally has skittered to some 5.64 million people, the lowest monthly count since February 1999 and a sorry shadow of the nearly 6.18 million who toiled in the sector in the go-go days of late 2006.

What’s the problem? Blame economic sluggishness, Washington demagoguery and, most of all, rampant uncertainty. Financiers, like lots of other folks, don’t know whether a much-trumpeted double-dip recession is in the offing. They still don’t know what exactly the folks in D.C. will loose on them in the way of financial reform. And, more immediately, they don’t know whether those customers they’ve been currying favor with for months will ever get off the dime.

Just look at the paralysis in the new-issues market. Over 170 companies have filed for initial public offerings this year, the most since 2007. But now fears abound that the lackluster markets could keep many of those IPOs in the wings. Worse, while aged titans such as GM garner the attention, experts quoted by USA Today warn that lots of innovative little guys seem to staying on the sidelines. It’s those up-and-comers that have driven past market rebounds and created the fee-generating business Wall Street counts on.

The FUD factor seems to be keeping plenty of would-be bankers out of pinstripes, at least for the time being. Fear, uncertainty and doubt have long been enshrined on Wall Street, of course, though folks did seem to forget that in the first half of the opening decade of the 2000s. The last half of the decade, of course, restored FUD in all its ugly glory, cutting short plenty of budding investment-banking careers.

Sadly, the bloodletting has not stopped. Look at New York alone. A modest number of private-sector jobs (29,000) helped keep the statewide unemployment rate at 8.2% in July, the latest period measured by the New York State Department of Labor. But the job count in financial activities is down 7,200 from July 2009.

Eventually, the numbers in lower Manhattan and nationally will turn around. Finance is too important to keep shrinking. Companies will need capital and they’ll have to look to Wall Street to rustle it up. Investors, too, will rediscover value in those beaten-down stocks. It may be, in fact, that the market just got ahead of itself and needed the bracing slap it got in recent months.

But that doesn’t mean the capital markets couldn’t use some help from Washington. Certainly, money won’t be on the table – plenty was already spent and demagogues have made it all but impossible for more stimulus money to go to Wall Street, at least directly. What’s more, tax relief for big-money investors seems hardly likely.

What Washington could do, however, is clarify the rules. Chip away at that uncertainty by making it clear what sorts of risk-taking will be tolerated and what won’t be. Make sure that big banks have the ability to take prudent risks – certainly not the foolhardy ones that pushed a few erstwhile titans over the cliff a few years ago, but smart and necessary gambles, nonetheless. If animal spirits are suppressed, no real recovery is possible. If bankers fear more Congressional perp walks, how can they back the next Apple or Microsoft?

And another thing Washington could do is put an end to Wall Street-bashing. The next round of elections, sadly, will likely spawn a fresh wave of attacks on fatcats, bankers and assorted financial miscreants. The targets are all too easy to hit and pillorying them plays well in the hard-pressed corners of America where finance is a four-letter word. Look for the rhetoric to ratchet up.

Today’s financiers, of course, can shake off the attacks – so long as there’s no legislation attached to them. But if the best and brightest of the post-recession generation listen to the Populist set and shun the vilified sector, who will fill those jobs eventually? If we are to keep yet another national industrial champion – Wall Street — from losing out to foreign rivals, our most talented hands will be needed. Our leaders ought to be making them feel good about it, not ashamed. And our bankers ought to be taking a few more chances and hiring them.

Double-dipping?

Gentle reader,

Here is an excerpted take on the question of a double-dip recession, from the people at CalculatedRisk, a blog I dip into now and again. Echoes a post here a couple days ago, but with some more detail. Call us a pair of Pollyannas, but maybe we’re onto something.

Personally, I get nervous when conventional wisdom all moves in one direction — as the sliding markets lately seem to suggest. I’ll stick with the contrarians.

Tuesday, June 29, 2010
2nd Half: Slowdown or Double-Dip?

by CalculatedRisk on 6/29/2010 04:00:00 PM

No one has a crystal ball, but it appears the U.S. economy will slow in the 2nd half of 2010.

For the unemployed and marginally employed, and for many other Americans suffering with too much debt or stagnant real incomes, there is little difference between slower growth and a double-dip recession. What matters to them is jobs and income growth.

In both cases (slowdown or double-dip), the unemployment rate will probably increase and wages will be under pressure. It is just a matter of degrees.

The arguments for a slowdown and double-dip recession are basically the same: less stimulus spending, state and local government cutbacks, more household saving impacting consumption, another downturn in housing, and a slowdown and financial issues in Europe and a slowdown in China. It is only a question of magnitude of the impact.

My general view has been that the recovery would be sluggish and choppy and I think this slowdown is part of the expected “choppiness”. I still think the U.S. will avoid a technical “double-dip” recession.

Usually the deeper the recession, the more robust the recovery. That didn’t happen this time (no “V-shaped” recovery), and it is probably worth reviewing why this period is different than an ordinary recession-recovery cycle.

# First, this recession was preceded by the bursting of the credit bubble (especially housing) leading to a financial crisis. And there is research showing recoveries following financial crisis are typically more sluggish than following other recessions. See Carmen Reinhart and Kenneth Rogoff: “The Aftermath of Financial Crises”

An examination of the aftermath of severe financial crises shows deep and lasting effects on asset prices, output and employment. … Even recessions sparked by financial crises do eventually end, albeit almost invariably accompanied by massive increases in government debt.

# Second, most recessions have followed interest rate increases from the Fed to fight inflation, and after the recession starts, the Fed lowers interest rates. There is research suggesting the Fed would have to push the Fed funds rate negative to achieve the same monetary stimulus as following previous recessions. See San Francisco Fed Letter by Glenn Rudebusch The Fed’s Exit Strategy for Monetary Policy.

The graph from Rudebusch’s shows a modified Taylor rule. According to Rudebusch’s estimate, the Fed Funds rate should be around minus 5% right now if we ignore unconventional policy (obviously there is a lower bound) and probably close to minus 3% if we include unconventional policy. Obviously the Fed can’t lower rates using conventional policy, although it is possible for more unconventional policy.

# Third, usually the engines of recovery are investment in housing (not existing home sales) and consumer spending. Both are still under severe pressure with the large overhang of housing inventory, and the need for households to repair their balance sheet (the saving rate will probably rise – slowing consumption growth).

On this third point, I put together a table of housing supply metrics last weekend to help track the housing market. It is hard to have a robust economic recovery without a recovery in residential investment – and there will be no strong recovery in residential investment until the excess housing supply is reduced substantially.

During previous recoveries, housing played a critical role in job creation and consumer spending. But not this time. Residential investment is mostly moving sideways.

It isn’t the size of the sector (currently only about 2.5% of GDP), but the contribution during the recovery that matters – and housing is usually the largest contributor to economic growth and employment early in a recovery.

Two somewhat positive points: 1) builders will deliver a record low number of housing units in 2010, and that will help reduce the excess supply (see: Housing Stock and Flow), and 2) usually a recession (or double-dip) is preceded by a sharp decline in Residential Investment (housing is the best leading indicator for the business cycle), and it hard for RI to fall much further!

So I’m sticking with a slowdown in growth.