
A U.S. Recession Isn't Imminent If You Look at Google Trends - pseudolus
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-07-24/google-recession-indicators-signal-little-concern-datatrek-says
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dabei
By the time you can tell imminent recession from Google Trends it's too late
to do something about it.

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User23
The article specifically states why they believe it is a leading indicator.
For example people search for [unemployment] when they hear the rumors of
layoffs or otherwise are worried, not after they happen.

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tcbawo
Hedge funds don't use Google trends as an indicator. They hire photographers
with infrared lenses to gauge the inventory of oil refineries and shipping
depots, or buy non-public location/foot traffic. I would not be surprised if
spotting a trend online actually would be too late to be actionable.

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User23
Given their recent performance, why would you extol the acumen of hedge funds?
Despite a recent bounce, they still can't even beat the S&P 500, which has no
load funds available. Hedge funds are a tool for making hedge fund managers
money, not their investors.

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tcbawo
Extolling? No. My point is that hedge funds have resources and smart people
working on signals that they will trade on before you see them in Google
trends.

Also, some hedge funds do well while others do not. Most are very secretive
and many have proprietary investment arms that are wildly profitable.

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CuriouslyC
Wildly profitable in the short term. A lot of funds also fail. In the long
term there is too much money to be made by demonstrating your ability to
consistently beat the market for the type of smoke and mirrors you're talking
about to be a real thing.

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dawhizkid
Perhaps the most concerning stats I've seen are around fast rising consumer
debt levels (and upticks in default rates on credit card debt + auto loan
debt).

If life was so good for so many people, how/why are so many people borrowing
in the first place and have trouble paying it back?

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JamesBarney
One of the reasons so many people are borrowing is the low interest rates. I
could afford to buy my last car cash but for 1% financing for 3 years I'd
rather have the cash.

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tempsy
That doesn’t explain rising late payment/default rates. Also (holy shit) the
average credit card APR is 15%, apparently a record high since 1994. I do not
pay interest on my cards, but I have a very high credit score and my rewards
cards are all >22% APR.

Something is very wrong if banks are borrowing at record low rates and yet
consumers are borrowing in record amounts at record high rates!

Source: [https://www.creditkarma.com/credit-cards/i/average-apr-on-
cr...](https://www.creditkarma.com/credit-cards/i/average-apr-on-credit-card/)

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User23
Credit cards are usury unless you have the cash flow and discipline to pay the
complete amount due every statement. They're barely a step above payday and
title loans (not in absolute effective APR, but morally).

Personally I prefer to just use a charge card.

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jhoechtl
> Searches for television, YouTube and Netflix tend to coincide with cuts to
> overtime hours that give workers more time to consume media, they said.

In ancient Rome this was called bread and games.

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cdangermouse
That's one recession's worth of data, barely a trend. However if you have a
look at all the other indicators that have been around for over 100 years,
alarm bells are ringing left right and centre...

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Anon1096
We don't have (effective) recession indicators that are 100s of years old.
We're not even sure that the ones that are 25 years old still hold up in the
modern day. So no, there's no alarm bells ringing "left, right, and centre."
It is very possible that no recession occurs in the next few years.

