Thawing America’s unchosen
Time will tell the full effect the C19 shutdown will have on the American economy. Here are the signals thus far.
NYC vacancies nearly triple
Apartment vacancies jumped from 1,750 during the last week of March to nearly 5,000 listings the week ending May 10, apartment listing website StreetEasy reported. NYC Mayor de Blasio expects the city to begin reopening in June.
14.7% U.S. unemployment rate in April
Over 20% Unemployment in Nevada, Hawaii and Michigan
It’s taken only 2 months to surpass the economic fall of the Great Recession
Since the first stay-at-home orders began, the ensuing downturn has surpassed the Great Recession that spanned 18 months between 2007 and 2009.
Oil benchmark boomerangs
In April, West Texas Intermediate—the U.S. oil benchmark—plunged below zero for the first time on record. May, however, could be WTI’s best month ever, dating back to its inception in 1983—an astonishing turnaround month-on-month.
NASDAQ jumps back
After the worst quarter of economic growth in memory, Nasdaq closed in the second week of May having nearly erased its calendar-year losses. The Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 remain down for the year, but have increased by about 25 percent since their March low.
Furloughs: 3.4 million
Over 20 million workers lost their jobs in April, up from 3.9 million in March. Many of these are temporary. Permanent job losses increased by around 500,000, to 2 million. The CBO projects that unemployment will fall to 11.7 percent by the end of the year.
The year ahead:
- US GDP Q2 -39.6%
- Y/Y size reduction in US economy by end of 2020 -5.6%
- US GDP Q3 23.5%
- First project of positive annual growth 2021
- US GDP Q4 10.5%
- The longer the economy remains even partially closed, the more employers will go bankrupt or shrink their workforces.
