None of four US recession gauges flashed an alarm as of Oct. 23, according to figures from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis and the US Labor Department.
The readings put all four measures in their normal range under the supplied classifications. However, no numerical alarm thresholds were available for the unemployment rate or the four-week average of initial jobless claims.
The classifications and the numerical thresholds provide different levels of detail about the readings. All four classifications indicated no alarm, but the available figures specified a recession-signal or inversion threshold for only the Sahm rule and the Treasury spread.
The 10-year minus 2-year Treasury spread stood at a positive 0.31 percentage point. The St. Louis Fed figures showed no days with an inverted spread over the preceding two years.
Zero marks the boundary for that gauge: a negative spread means the 10-year Treasury yields less than the two-year Treasury. The positive reading therefore did not cross the inversion threshold.
The spread's current reading and its record over the preceding two years both showed an absence of inversion. The current figure described the gap on the reference date, while the count of inverted days covered the longer period.
The Sahm rule stood at 0.00, below the supplied recession-signal threshold of a reading above 0.5 percentage point. It compares three-month average unemployment with its lowest three-month average over the past year.
A reading above that threshold has historically coincided with the start of a recession. The current reading did not meet that condition.
The unemployment rate stood at 4.2%, just 0.1 percentage point above its lowest level over the preceding year. Its green classification indicated no alarm, although the available figures did not specify the increase needed to trigger one.
The four-week average of initial jobless claims stood at 198,000, unchanged from its lowest level over the preceding year. That measure also carried a green classification, without a numerical alarm threshold.
The comparisons with the preceding year's lows thus showed a small increase for unemployment and no change for the claims average. Those comparisons accompanied the green classifications, but neither supplied a numerical boundary at which its measure would signal an alarm.
The four readings describe where the gauges stood on the reference date. They do not establish whether a recession will begin or whether one has been avoided.
