A big bank economist is a good choice for a breakfast economic briefing, because they tend to be optimistic and almost always see growth ahead.
That’s the view of Carlos Gomes of the Bank of Nova Scotia, who is speaking right now to the GrainWorld Tuesday breakfast.
“We are in a synchronized expansion,” Gomes said.
“We are seeing growth everywhere.”
There is more growth in the emerging markets and especiallys the BRICs – Brazil, Russia, India and China – but even the U.S. and Europe are growing.
Global trade is rebounding and is back to 2008 levels.
World employment is growing too.
Inflation in the BRIC countries is a worry, as is double-digit increases in food prices in developing nations.
“That is something that is not going to change in the next little while,” Gomes said of food price inflation.
Both the TED spread and the VIX – two stress and fear indicators – have risen recently, but are far beneath levels they reached during the 2008-09 meltdown. The recent rise doesn’t mean the rise in confidence around the world in the past two years will reverse.
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“Conditions remain fairly healthy,” said Gomes.
He’s had lots of stuff to say about the TED spread and VIX that I can’t get into now, but will do a post on after this conference is over. I miss the TED spread and VIX, about which I wrote lots during the meltdown, so it’s nice to hear an analyst who’s comfortable talking about it. Gomes is a CFA, so he understands these measures, which isn’t true of many analysts or of the common unwashed. In fact, someone just got up here and pointed out he doesn’t know what the TED spread is. To me his discussion of the TED spread and VIX were the highlights of the presentation, but it takes a bunch of explaining, which is why analysts and scribblers like me seldom talk much about it. After you provide all the background to explain it, your listeners are soundly asleep.
