An extended period of recession talk (or the potential of more aptly put) has led to an almost cultish following of the everyday movements of "recession indicators" by investment professionals and weekend warriors alike. The speed at which data is now available to all is beyond any previous comparison, and the channels through which data is available (both scrubbed and accurate and otherwise) is also beyond anything we have seen before. There are some knock on consequences of this abundance of availability, some of which we still need to wait to suss themselves out.

 

There is the very possibility that the potential of a recession can be vaulted to an actual recession, simply by having too many assuming it is about to happen. If the data is starting to be less good than it was before, then things must be getting worse right? And if things are getting worse, then we should pull the reins in before falling victim to the inevitable right? And if we all pull the reins in before the numbers have actually degraded to "recession territory", we can ultimately turn a sniffle into a full blown flu just by virtue of thinking we already have the flu (paging Dr. Google anyone?)

 

All of that being said, we have the tools to be aware, so let's make sure that we are. I may be compounding an already existing problem by doing this, but here goes anyway. RBC has released it's most recent US Recession Scorecard including a digital friendly format, and it can be yours simply by clicking this link.

 

There....I may have just made the problem worse.