Brad Setser: This really doesn’t look good

[RedEarth]

This really doesn’t look good
Posted on Sunday, January 11th, 2009

By bsetser

Words don’t really do justice to the brutality of recent downturn in Korean and Taiwanese exports.



These look a lot like charts of financial variables after a bubble bursts, not charts of the level of exports. That isn’t good

Looking just as the monthly data risks being misleading. There is a lot of seasonality in Taiwan’s exports. They usually dip in February. It is a short month, it often corresponds with the Chinese new year and the data isn’t seasonally adjusted. A small dip in December after the end of the Western holiday season also isn’t unusual. But such a big dip in December is most unusual. Plotting the rolling 3m sum eliminates the big February dip. The current downturn is real.

more...

http://blogs.cfr.org/setser/2009/01/11/this-really-doesnt-look-good/

[CrazyLate]

1. I'm getting ready

for the 2nd Great Depression.

[madrchsod]

2. south korea and taiwan were the first asian countries

that the us manufactures ran to in the 70`s...i should feel bad for the workers but they are the ones who are doing my old union job. millions of workers in the steel forming industry lost their jobs to these two countries....