MacroScope

The euro zone slipped deeper into recession than economists expected in the fourth quarter of 2012 as Germany and France– the region’s two largest economies – shrank 0.6 percent and 0.3 percent respectively on a quarterly basis.

The data is a reminder of the plight still facing the euro zone as it struggles to shake off a three-year debt crisis, which the region has sought to fight with harsh, growth-crimping austerity.

The European Central Bank’s promise to buy the bonds of struggling sovereigns has spurred investors back into those markets and helped reduce borrowing costs. While one trillion euros of cheap funding made available to banks in late 2011 and early 2012 also gave investors greater confidence, the benefits of such policies have yet to translate into improvements in the real economy.

According to David Schnautz, interest rate strategist, at Commerzbank:

The gap is still widening between what the market is pricing in and what the real economy or the overall situation actually justifies. The Spanish Q4 GDP number was a very nasty reminder that things are still in the doldrums there.

Spain, the euro zone’s fourth largest economy, released figures two weeks ago which showed it remained mired in recession after a 0.7 percent contraction in the fourth quarter. Data this week shows Italy’s GDP fell by 0.9 percent – its sixth successive quarterly fall.

More than six years after its spectacular collapse, the U.S. housing market – the laggard of the struggling economic recovery – may be poised for pickup, driven in part by an upswing in remodeling, Bank of America-Merrill Lynch economist Michelle Meyer thinks.

Gains are likely to be modest at first, and are subject to volatility since overall economic growth may well slow in the second half of this year. Also, given the deep hole housing has fallen into, the market is still far from a robust recovery, Meyer wrote in a note to clients drawn from recent research.

Still, some evidence points to the beginnings of an upswing. For one, data already indicate a rebound in spending on renovations. Remodeling will pick up steam as investors convert foreclosed properties into rentals, and homeowners who have held off doing repairs or additions decide the time is ripe, Meyer said.

America caught a cold and now China has one too. 

IMF chief Dominique Strauss-Kahn said on Monday that the Fund could cut its forecast for China's economic growth in 2009 to around  5 percent. To think that only last year China was galloping at a double-digit clip. It's staggering, and it's worrying.

Worrying, for one thing, because  - as the Heritage Foundation's Derek Scissors puts it - "the American economic slump is running into the Chinese economic slump, creating the conditions for a face-off between Beijing and the U.S. Congress, possibly leading to destabilization of the world's most important bilateral economic relationship". 

He argues that the new U.S. administration, confronted with a record-breaking bilateral deficit and soaring unemployment, could impose prohibitive tariffs or erect other barriers to Chinese goods. The EU, Japan and others would then be permitted by WTO rules to raise barriers against a diversion of Chinese goods to protect their markets, and "some form of Chinese retaliation is certain".