Why We Haven't Thrown In The Towel On The Recession Call

Recessions aren't all about GDP - here's why

That is because recessions are not confined to real GDP, even though it’s the holy grail for the markets and for this version of the Federal Reserve. Remember, we had back-to-back declines in real GDP in the first and second quarters of 2022, and the Fed had barely gotten started on hikes. Yet there was no recession. We never had back-to-back GDP contractions in 2001, and yet the official recession that year commenced in March (interestingly, the soft-landing view at the time was emboldened by the +2.4% QoQ real growth rate, SAAR, in the prior quarter).