American Gangster

This past weekend, I watched American Gangster. Though I had seen the previews earlier, I had no expectations going in, and I must say I was pleasantly surprised. It was a gripping movie and it certainly had my attention for over two and a half hours.

The biopic movie, about the real life gangster Frank Lucas and Detective Richie Roberts, is definitely worth a watch. It is set in the 1970’s New York underworld. The film explores the rise and fall of Lucas who also happens to be the guy who was above the Italian mafia at that time. Meanwhile, throughout Lucas’s rise, an outcast cop named Richie Roberts begins to put the pieces together and discovers that Lucas is the next big crime boss and at all costs wants to and manages to bring him down. A great gangster film ensues!

I am sure all of you can read the reviews of the movies online, but what intrigued me about the movie was the irony of both characters. Their professional and personal lives are flipped. Frank does dishonest things for a living at every turn, but in his personal life lives by a strict moral code of humility, honesty, church and family. Richie is a painfully honest cop, but his personal life is a garbage dump of lies, failed relationships, prostitutes and insecurities.

The movie did get me curious and I did do some looking around to see the kind of life the real Frank Lucas and Richie Roberts are leading today… and believe it or not, they are good friends today. It was one of those movies that I was thinking about the next day (rarely does that happen :)

Anyways, for those interested in looking/reading about the real American Gangster, here are some interesting links

http://nymag.com/nymetro/news/people/features/3649/

http://www.cnn.com/2007/SHOWBIZ/Movies/11/09/film.real.americangangster.ap/index.html
http://www.daylife.com/topic/Frank_Lucas

And watch this video

http://www.charlierose.com/guests/richie-roberts

The Shrinking Economy

The U.S. economic data seems to be coming in much stronger than expected. Real GDP rose 3.9% in the second quarter and payrolls jumped 166,000 in October. Does this mean the economy is ignoring the housing problems and energy prices, or does it just mean that the eventual decline will be even worse?

The Federal Reserve's quarter-point interest rate cut on Oct. 31 suggests that they believe the worst is yet to come. Whether the economy is moving towards a slowdown or turns into a recession depends on three factors:

• Can consumers continue to ignore energy and home prices?
• Will the current problems in financial markets extend the downturn beyond housing into other sectors, especially commercial construction?
• Will overseas economies continue to grow and buy more U.S. goods?

The higher oil price does raise the probability of recession. Three consecutive quarters of growth near or less than 1.5% mean that a negative quarter is very likely but lets hope with luck there won't be two in a row.

SPENDING SPREE

The ability of the American consumer to keep on spending continues to surprise pretty much one and all. Consumer spending again rose at a 3.0% annual rate in the third quarter, rebounding from a slow 1.4% in the second quarter. The saving rate rose to 0.9% in September. So far, however, it is clear that consumers have no doubt been living up to—if not beyond—their incomes.

Even more important is the rise in oil prices, which is squeezing consumer buying power. Oil hit $97/barrel on Nov. 6. It is widely being forecasted that the price will retreat to $85/barrel over the next few months. Although the underlying supply and demand conditions suggest that prices should be lower, worries about the middle east, problems between Turkey and the Iraqi Kurds, with President Musharraf in Pakistan, and with Iran all add to fears of supply disruption
The risk of further price hikes is clearly very real, and these could further squeeze consumers.
It is expected to slow, but not stop consumer spending.

GLOBAL EFFECT

The major area of strength for the U.S. economy is foreign trade. The widening trade gap had been a drag on GDP over the last several years, but it has been improving since last January. U.S. growth has slowed, slowing imports, while growth overseas has remained stronger. The falling dollar has also helped boost exports. Over the last four quarters, the improvement in the real trade deficit has added 0.75% to real GDP, accounting for 30% of the 2.6% real GDP growth.
Asian growth appears solid. Chinese GDP is set to climb 11.5% this year, with Indian real GDP set to touch 9.5%. Some slowdown in both is likely next year, but China's should remain in the double digits. The developed countries are doing less well. Europe is slowing, in part because the strength of the euro hurts exports and U.S. growth is slower. Japan's real GDP fell in the second quarter but should rebound in the third. One advantage for the rest of the world is that the U.S. slowdown has been concentrated in residential construction. Because residential construction has a relatively small import component, the effect on exports from Asia and other markets has been much less than if it had been concentrated elsewhere.

There has been a lot of talk about the decoupling of the world economy. That metaphor is incorrect. The world is more tightly coupled than it has ever been by financial and trade flows. The difference is not that the train has come uncoupled but that the train has more engines pulling it. A decade ago, the U.S. was 23% of world GDP in terms of purchasing power and accounted for about the same percentage of world growth. Today, the U.S.'s share of world GDP has shrunk to 20%, and it accounted for only 12% of 2006 growth. China, in contrast, has risen to 15% of world GDP and 30% of world growth.

Oil prices are a problem for other countries besides the U.S., but there is a critical difference between a rise in oil prices caused by stronger demand and higher oil prices caused by supply disruption. When demand pulls oil prices, the higher costs to the oil importers are balanced by higher income for oil exporters, who either spend the money or invest it. This recycling of petroleum revenues helps keep the world economy going despite higher costs. It is not a perfect balance, and it has contributed to the problems of excess liquidity that has inflated bubbles around the world, but it is better than the alternative.

The dollar is of course going to continue to fall. The current account deficit, although it has shrunk, remains very wide at 5.5% of GDP in the third quarter. In the last two years, the inflow of capital seeking higher yields in the U.S. offset this. But a year ago, U.S. Treasuries were trading a percentage point higher than equivalent European government bonds. Today, that spread has shrunk to only 15 basis points (bps). In addition, foreign investors are worried about the dollar decline, making European investments look like a better bet. August was the first significant outflow from the U.S. financial markets in over five years; it will continue.

Fed’s work is cut out

The Federal Reserve has cut interest rates twice already, by a total of 75 bps. The Fed statement was tough, but no one is denying the weakness in the economy and it is likely to force another rate cut, most likely early next year. The Fed is right to be concerned about inflation, especially given the falling dollar and its impact on consumer prices. But in the short run, recession is the bigger risk. Even if there were no election in 2008, the Fed would have to focus on real growth—at least for a few quarters.