Gasoline Sales Fall Sparking Recession Concerns

Gasoline purchases can be a powerful signal about the consumer economy, and last month’s drop off in demand was downright recession-like.

But economists don’t see a recession, and energy analysts say demand picked back up in the last week to a more normal level. Now, they are waiting to see if that continues, and to see if a massive gasoline glut begins to disappear.

In a report Wednesday, Goldman Sachs analysts said while they don’t believe there is a recession, they noted that the implied drop of 460,000 barrels a day in January, or 5.2 percent year over year, is the kind of tumble seen only during a recession.

“…such a decline has only occurred in four periods since 1960, during which time PCE contracted,” the analysts wrote. They note that government data on consumption — personal consumption expenditures, or PCE — dropped sharply at the same time in those other periods, but it is not lower right now. PCE is expected to grow by 2.6 percent in the first quarter.

“Goldman doesn’t think there’s a recession, and I don’t either,” said Tom Kloza, global head of energy analysis at Oil Price Information Services. But Kloza acknowledged there was a mysterious decline in the demand for gasoline decline in January. The government data measures wholesale demand, but Kloza looked at data on drivers’ ac

via CNBC

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Alfonso Esparza

Alfonso Esparza

Senior Currency Analyst at Market Pulse
Alfonso Esparza specializes in macro forex strategies for North American and major currency pairs. Upon joining OANDA in 2007, Alfonso Esparza established the MarketPulseFX blog and he has since written extensively about central banks and global economic and political trends. Alfonso has also worked as a professional currency trader focused on North America and emerging markets. He has been published by The MarketWatch, Reuters, the Wall Street Journal and The Globe and Mail, and he also appears regularly as a guest commentator on networks including Bloomberg and BNN. He holds a finance degree from the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education (ITESM) and an MBA with a specialization on financial engineering and marketing from the University of Toronto.
Alfonso Esparza