Actionable Intel -- September 10, 2024

Locator: 48556INV.

Liz Sonders, managing director and Chief Investment Strategist at Schwab generates a gazillion graphics every month, but seldom provides any "actionable intel" for the average, small, retail investor. 

Examples: 

• year-ahead inflation chart, yesterday, September 9, 2024:

• risk of recession, yesterday, September 9, 2024:

I assume this is useful information for "some," but for me, making investment decisions, these charts have no actionable intel or actionable information. 

On the other hand, Beth and Evan provide a lot of actionable information. 

So does "Portfolio Parrot." Link here for example. 

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European Competitiveness

Link here.

Go direct to the report.

The EU is entering the first period in its recent history in which growth will not be supported by rising populations.

By 2040, the workforce is projected to shrink by close to 2 million workers each year. We will have to lean more on productivity to drive growth. If the EU were to maintain its average productivity growth rate since 2015, it would only be enough to keep GDP constant until 2050 – at a time when the EU is facing a series of new investment needs that will have to be financed through higher growth

To digitalise and decarbonise the economy and increase our defence capacity, the investment share in Europe will have to rise by around 5 percentage points of GDP to levels last seen in the 1960s and 70s. This is unprecedented: for comparison, the additional investments provided by the Marshall Plan between 1948-51 amounted to around 1-2% of GDP annually.

If Europe cannot become more productive, we will be forced to choose. We will not be able to become, at once, a leader in new technologies, a beacon of climate responsibility and an independent player on the world stage. We will not be able to finance our social model. We will have to scale back some, if not all, of our ambitions.

This is an existential challenge.

Energy costs in Europe: