The February 2011 reports on new unit vehicle sales and the Reserve Bank note issue have been released and we are able to update our Hard Number Index (HNI) of the current state of the SA economy. As may be seen below, the economy continued to pick up momentum in February 2011.
The very up to date HNI is proving a reliable leading indicator of both the Coinciding Business Cycle Indicator of the Reserve Bank (updated to November 2010) and the Reserve Bank Leading Indicator of the SA Business cycle (updated to December 2010).
Continue reading Hard Number Index: Maintaining speed
Tag: Business Cycle
Vehicle sales: Why a strong rand is good
It was another big month for unit vehicle sales in February. On a seasonally adjusted basis sales were ahead of the January numbers, which in turn were well up on December.
Year on year growth in unit sales has remained in the plus 20% range. However the quarter to quarter growth rates, which are not dependent on base effects, have surged ahead and are now running well above a 40% per annum rate.
Continue reading Vehicle sales: Why a strong rand is good
The Hard Number Index: Recovery remains well on course
The Reserve Bank announced its note issue for January this morning. This enables us to complete our Hard Number Index (HNI) of the immediate state of the SA economy. Our HNI combines unit vehicle sales with the note issue (adjusted for inflation in equal weights) to provide a very up to date indicator. We compare trends in the HNI with the Reserve Bank coinciding indicator of the state of the business cycle, although this has only been updated to October 2010. Three months can be a very long time in economic life. Continue reading The Hard Number Index: Recovery remains well on course
The building cycle: When a plan comes together
There are increasing signs that the global economic recovery is building momentum, and is very strong in many instances. We saw this last week with Chinese GDP numbers for the fourth quarter, which grew at an annualised 12.7%. But even in the developed world the signs are looking promising, with good business activity survey numbers out of Japan and Germany, and a promising set of jobless claims numbers out of the US last week.
Continue reading the Daily View here: Daily View 24 January 2011