(mis)Leading Indicators

Today's headline:

"Economic indicators and survey show recession easing"

Not exactly, that is a bit of a stretch. The facts are that leading indicators for the US economy declined again in March and have been negative for the past 9 months. January's results were also revised from positive to negative. Furthermore the 6 month decrease of 2.5% was much worse than the 1.4% decline from the previous 6 month period. Does that sound like a recession that is easing?

It is likely that you may start to see the rate of decline begin to slow but that still does not point towards an actual bottom for the economy. While it is positive that the rate of decline is slowing we will need to see stabilization and a turn towards recovery at some point and that point appears to be several months away at a minimum.