The Chief Economist: 2Q2024 U.S. Economic Outlook
Highlights
- Economy is normalizing.
- Inflation still decelerating.
- Fed risking a mistake.
- Rate cuts coming, inevitably.
- CRE would benefit from stability.
Welcome loyal readers and new subscribers to The Chief Economist by BGO. My name is Ryan Severino, CFA, and this week's newsletter will provide a timely focus on the U.S. economy. Let's get right to it!
One quarter of the way through 2024, the US economy has performed largely as we expected. Economic growth has slowed from 2023’s outsized, unsustainable pace, but remains healthy. Consumption’s strong run continues. Private investment rebounded from a slow fourth quarter. Fiscal policy remains active, if not excessively stimulative. Inflation is decelerating, though slowly. And interest rates remain elevated. More broadly, we see an economy that is normalizing after some wild swings up and down over the last four years, not one that is simply slowing. As we move further away from the exogenous shock of the pandemic, those reverberations have lessened, and the economy is increasingly operating closer to pre-pandemic norms. But how should we think about the trajectory of the economy for the balance of the year under these conditions? And what could that mean for commercial real estate (CRE) and its own normalization after such an unusual period?
