What if … David Rosenberg sees 1992-1993 al over again :” This is 1992-1993 all over again when the commercial banks used the steep curve as an opportunity to reliquify their balance sheets and the flip side of that process was a listless and jobless recovery.”

What if… John William, proprietor of Shadow Government Statistics notes that every recession in the last four decades has had at least one positive quarter-to-quarter GDP reading, only to be followed by a renewed downturn.

What if … Next economic quarter disappoints.

Well, very soon the answers…

Despite recent signs that the German economy  is not faring as well as hoped, we remain confident that its relatively sound structural position will ensure that it is one of the first economies to emerge from recession. By contrast, the Southern European economies and Ireland are beset with much greater difficulties. The Irish and Spanish economies are already facing the fall-out from a major house price correction. Greece, Portugal and Spain all have current account deficits of around 10% of GDP and may need a sustained period of below trend growth and a large improvement in their competitiveness to reduce their reliance on foreign funds. On the face of it, then, these economies face an altogether longer and more painful adjustment.