Anthony Chan Quarter Quotations

We still have a labor market that's deteriorating, and today's numbers epitomize that. We're going to continue to see deterioration, which will pose serious challenges to consumer confidence and keep the economy soft for another quarter or two.

I think the risk is the downside, not the upside, ... I think the markets are fairly nervous about the prospects for growth. They're going to be dissecting the number. If we have slower than expected consumer spending and stronger than expected inventory growth, that's not going to bode well for the next quarter or so.

There's no question unemployment is what drives consumer confidence, which in turn drives consumer spending. We have to be realistic and accept the notion that, as we enter the first quarter and December, these sales are going to get a bit weaker. We're still in a recession.

It's a healthy development. It tells us the underlying momentum of the economy was stronger, so we can afford to take a bigger hit in the second quarter and still have respectable growth for the year.

The prospects of 4 percent real GDP growth (or possibly more after future data revisions) during the third quarter are back on the table,

This report supports Greenspan's rosy economic view that the economy is likely to continue to grow unabated this quarter thereby justifying continued increases in short-term rates.

For the moment the third quarter is probably going to be similar to what we saw the last three months -- probably between 250,000 to 300,000 new jobs every month,

The momentum going into 2006 is clearly healthy. We will be able to withstand weaker growth for the rest of the quarter and almost not miss a heart beat.

Yes, Greenspan does admit the obvious, that the real federal funds rate has risen considerably, but he quickly concludes that the rate 'remains fairly low'. This is Fed-speak for the notion that the Fed will continue to raise rates by a quarter percentage point...as far as the eye can see.

The bottom line is that consumers experienced a soft patch in the first quarter and they appear to be emerging from it,

All this stimulus is going to work, ... just not overnight. It's probably going to take a couple of quarters to work itself out.

We'll start seeing solid and significant evidence of recovery in the manufacturing sector in the first quarter next year. It was the first to go into recession and will be the first to come out.

It's a wake-up call. One quarter does not make a trend, but we have to be more on our guard.