FRED Expands World Uncertainty Index Data
The St. Louis Fed announces FRED Expands World Uncertainty Index Data
FRED has added 286 new indicators of uncertainty, expanding the World Uncertainty Index portion of the Economic Policy Uncertainty release with indexes for individual countries. These indexes—developed by Hites Ahir (International Monetary Fund), Nicholas Bloom (Stanford University), and Davide Furceri (International Monetary Fund)—determine uncertainty using the frequency of the word “uncertainty” (and its variants) in the quarterly Economist Intelligence Unit country reports.
One Certainty
There is one amusing certainty in the World Uncertainty Index.
It’s useless.
And of course it is not even clear what the hell this is measuring.
Finally, if and when economists are ever certain about something non-trivial, they will be wrong.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
The level of uncertainty is considerably higher in most of the developing countries. I have gone through several articles that focuses on the policies of the global economy. There is a new WUI World Uncertainty Index building for 143 countries. Do visit CV Editing Service in UAE to get more updates on this topic.
The only thing that this action communicates is that the fed is getting fearful that it’s GDP (Global Debt Ponzi) is approaching the collapse stage. While my models suggest that we have a big stock market pullback over the next quarter, they also suggest that markets bottom in 2020 and then make new highs into 2023. After that the greatest depression begins and the whole corrupt fake money system dies under its own corrupt weight. Use this time to save for retirement outside of any government programs like pensions or 401k because I guarantee you that when the $hit hits the fan they will all be stolen with the stroke of a pen “for everyone’s safety and in the name of national security”. But physical gold and silver bullion coins owned by you and held by you personally will be beyond their reach because they will be beyond their knowledge. Bullion coins are like a Roth IRA. You pay taxes on the money to buy them but what happens after that point is nobody’t business but yours. WHAT CANNOT BE TRACKED CANNOT BE TAXED. All paper “assets” can be tracked. Physical bullion coins cannot. Sell them on craigslist very easily and meet in person.
what a fucking useless survey
Not to those who get paid the big bucks to produce it! Very important…
Only 286 new indicators of uncertainty?
Seems a bit low…
I would think Trump could contribute that many all by himself…
And even with 286 more indicators, I bet we still get “unexpected” commentary.
Here is something that is a bit more defined and easy to track. CFNAI-MA3 is still bouncing around 0 and has been since the great recession ended. If it drops below -0.7 then a recession is possible. We are in negative territory now but given the interest rate environment we are in, we are closer to 1% GDP as suggested by GDPNow and other real time GDP measures.
“Finally, if and when economists are ever certain about something non-trivial, they will be wrong.”
I’m not sure about that!