Hardly a "Slash"

It was another "slasher" headline... I am not sure who first "broke" the story, but it was almost humorous to watch all the mainstream media outlets follow each other using that worn out verb.

"The Fed slashes 2009 forecast"

This is hardly a "slash" of projections and certainly not surprising...

You may remember the details on fed projections from 43 of their professional forecasters last week. If not, have a look here.

You will note from the raw data there that real GDP growth is due to resume in Q3 of this year. The overall declining growth in Q1 and Q2 is old news. For a nice chart of the data, have a look here.

Even in this "slasher story" the projections are for 4 quarters of solid growth in 2010 following the two quarters of GDP growth later this year.