Do we have a sustainable economic recovery yet?

Forecasts and projections galore over the past 3-4 months as the DJIA (read market indicators) gradually worked its way almost inching up to the 10,000 mark. Thankfully, unlike the all-pervading gloominess in early March, the biggest question currently in the minds of market pundits and investors is whether the rally is sustainable. Led from the front by Roubini, there are several economists forecasting a double dip recession and the market reverting back to pre-rally levels. Though I personally agree more with Summers than Roubini, it's difficult to stretch the optimism at this point to say that the market is completely on track to a V-shaped reversal.

A quick look a factors which support the sustained rally camp:

• Job losses are stabilizing - by labor department statistics, total nonfarm payroll employment declined by 263,000 in September. From May through September, job losses averaged 307,000 per month, compared with lossses averaging 645,000 per month from November 2008 to April 2009.
• Manufacturing supplier and purchaser indexes are up - for example, the Institute of Supply Management PMI index has gradually increased from 40.1 in April 2009 to 52.6 in Sep 2009, showing an uptick in 4 out of 5 month-to-month instances.
• Home price decline has been stopped across all major regions, with month-on-month price ncreases reported for Sep 09. Also, both new and existing home inventory are down to the 7-8 month levels as compared to the 11+ months inventory in Q4 2008 and Q1 2009.

On the other hand, those forecasting a double dip recession point to lack of fundamental strength in key indicators:

• Corporate budgets are generally flat and employers have not started hiring. This is supported by continued increase in unemployment, reduction in hours worked and lack of strong private sector new employment generation
• Manufacturing stats are just showing a blip to shore up inventories back to minimum levels
• Home foreclosure rates have not slowed down and home prices have not yet shown a consistent upward trend

Let's take a look at some of the key numbers from April to Sep 09 (wherever data is available):

Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep

Personal consumption expenditure (USD trillion) 9.18 9.19 9.20 9.22 9.31
Unemployment rate (%) 8.90 9.40 9.50 9.40 9.70 9.80
ISM index 40.10 42.80 44.80 48.90 52.90 52.60
Bank lending (USD btrillion) 9.25 9.34 9.33 9.26 9.20 9.11
New home sales (annualized in '000s) 352 346 384 429 426

(sorry for the mess up on the table - could not get it in neatly!)

As can be seen clearly, while new home sales and manufacturing indicators (using PMI as a proxy) has shown notable progress over the past 6 months, bank lending has yet to show any progress of improvement and so is the unemployment rate. This probably confirms the view that there is still quite some way to move forward for a sustainable recovery. Also, considering near-flat trends for personal consumption expenditure and hence fundamental demand drivers in general, it is perhaps easier to agree with the view that manufacturing stats are up primarily due to re-stocking pressure - due to drastic production cuts and abnormally low inventory levels during the past few quarters as against demand-driven growth.

Unless increased bank lending and government driven spending initiatives create enough employment, personal consumption expenditure would not pick up sufficiently to drive back demand for products and services. This, along with a sustained uptick in both personal and business confidence indices, is required to pave the way to recovery over the next few quarters.

Finally, i personally think that we are more on the way to a 'New normal' as against the pre-crisis economy - as I opined in the previous article too. The impact created due to the crisis is significant enough to affect long-term trends in spending and saving patterns, if not financial services lending patterns too! This will prevent a drastic v-shaped reversal hoped by early-mover market bulls. However, there is enough initial momentum to continue a path to recovery and hence there is no reason to expect a decline of market indicators back to the Q1 2009 levels. From a numbers perspective, assuming continued Fed and government support, I would rather bet on a slow, but volatile climb of the DJIA to 11,000 levels by Q3 2010 as against a move to 7000 or a 14000!

Due to the same reality, there is not enough fundamental strength for the drastic surge in retail stocks. Manufacturing stocks should see a tempered rise while home builder stocks, especially luxury builders, have quite a way to go before high multipliers are justified. I would personally bet on financial services picks with healthier balance sheets or consumer non-durables, and not retail at this point!