US Industrial Production Slows Slightly To 3.90% YoY As Capacity Utilization Rises To 80.27% In July (But M2 Money Growth Is Shrinking Awfully Fast And 10Y-2Y Yield Curve SCREAMS Impending Recession!)

Today’s US industrial production and capacity utilization numbers showed a nice “steady as she goes” slow decline from previous months, though still positive at 3.90% YoY.

And it is difficult to argue that the US is in a recession when capacity utilization is at 80.27%.

Notice that industrial production growth falls below 0% during a recession and capacity utilization slumps. We are NOT there … yet.

However, M2 Money growth is shrinking awfully fast.

While the US is technically in default (two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth), it doesn’t FEEL like a recession with 3.90% YoY industrial production growth and capacity utilization above 80%. During the Covid recession in early 2020, industrial production growth YoY had declined to -17.65% and capacity utilization shrank to 64.53%.

Speaking of a recession SIGNAL, the 10Y-2Y Treasury yield curve is SCREAMING impending recession.