The U.S. isn't entering recovery, bets Paul Tudor Jones, the billionaire hedge-fund manager who outperformed his peers last year.
Other fund managers agree.
"If we have a recovery at all, it isn't sustainable," Kevin Harrington, managing director at Clarium, told Bloomberg.
"This is more likely a ski-jump recession, with short-term stimulus creating a bump that will ultimately lead to a more precipitous decline later.
“Some critical initiatives have been cut short,” Tudor says.
“As a result, toxic assets remain on balance sheets and credit growth is likely to be subdued for a long period.”
Clarium, which oversees about $2 billion, is positioned for an equity bear market through investments in the U.S. dollar, Harrington says.
Falling stock prices will strengthen the currency by forcing leveraged investors to sell equities to pay down the dollar-denominated debt they used to finance those trades, he says.
Harrington also says his firm closely monitors the unemployment rate, including discouraged job applicants and those working part-time because they can’t find full-time positions.
Adjusting the jobless rate to reflect this brings the total of unemployed job seekers to 16 percent.
The fiscal health of the nation's cities represents more bad news for the national economy, according to the National League of Cities.
“The full weight of the decline in housing values has yet to be experienced by many cities, and property tax revenues will likely decline in 2010, 2011 and 2012 as declining property values are reflected in city property tax rolls," a recent NLC report noted.
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