Peter’s Blog

The better-than-expected non-farm payroll report for January along with the smaller interest rate hike delivered by the Federal Reserve at its February meeting increased optimism that the central bank can bring price inflation back to 2% without tanking the economy. But the shrinking money supply undercuts this soft landing narrative.

For the first time ever, the money supply contracted on an annual basis in 2022. The seasonally adjusted Money Supply in December was negative for a fifth consecutive month, coming in at -$147B. This was the largest monthly contraction in M2 going back to 1959. This type of contraction typically does not happen!

The 13-week annualized non-seasonally adjusted money supply growth rate is crashing at a time when it typically moves up. The market is becoming increasingly more vulnerable to a major event in the weeks or months ahead. Let’s take a look at the data…

Seasonally Adjusted Money Supply in October was negative for a third consecutive month, coming in at -$88B. This came on the heels of the largest drop in Money Supply ever last month.

Money Supply shrunk last month by $129B, the largest monthly fall ever going back to 1959. April and June also set records at the time from a gross change perspective. From a percentage amount, Feb. 1970 had been the largest contraction ever (-6.5% annualized), but the current month beat that number at -6.9% annualized.

Money Supply growth was barely positive in August at $2B and sits well below the $233B seen last year. As the chart below shows, Money Supply growth has collapsed since February. Last year started with five straight months above $200B, whereas 2022 has only seen one month above $100B and that was January.

Money Supply growth was positive in July at $42B but sits well below the $161B seen last year. As the chart below shows, Money Supply growth has collapsed since February. Last year started with 5 straight months above $200B whereas 2022 has only seen one month above $100B and that was January.

Money Supply growth is falling rapidly. Two of the last three months have seen a decrease in the seasonally adjusted M2 Money Supply with the recent month dropping $17B. Given that April was the first contraction in 12 years, two of the last three months being negative is an ominous sign.

The slowdown in money creation could be signaling a recession. The growth in the money supply has dropped precipitously over the last several months. As measured by M2, the money supply expanded by 6.6% year on year. That was down from April’s growth rate of 8.21%. In  May 2021, M2 grew by 14.30%. M2 growth […]

According to the seasonally adjusted data, M2 increased by $23B in May. Except for the contraction last month (the first contraction in 12 years), it was the smallest monthly increase in M2 since the start of COVID.