Pantheon Publications
Below is a list of our Publications for the last 5 months. If you are looking for reports older than 6 months please email info@pantheonmacro.com, or contact your account rep.
Please use the filters on the right to search for a specific date or topic.
Samuel Tombs
- Tariffs continued to lift goods prices in August; we think pass-through is now about one-third complete.
- Airline fares and accommodation services prices are unlikely to rise much further after leaping in August.
- The outsized August jump in CPI rents is just noise around a slowing trend; nothing to worry about.
- Retailers’ margins began to buckle in August under tariff pressure; expect a significant squeeze ahead.
- Producer prices for goods are still rising in response to tariffs, but the underlying cost picture is benign.
- The core PCE deflator likely rose briskly in August, but no sign of the services price surge implied by the ISM.
- Preliminary benchmarking indicates 911K fewer jobs were created in year to March; that’s a huge revision.
- Most of that downward revision likely reflects the initial overstatement of job creation at new businesses.
- The birth-death model is still make a big contribution today; payrolls have probably fallen over the summer.
- We think the core CPI rose by 0.4% in August, as pass-through from the tariffs intensified.
- Adobe’s Digital Price Index—a good guide to a segment of core goods prices—jumped in August.
- Prices for air travel and accommodation services are rebounding from Q2 weakness.
- Payrolls lack momentum, but the first estimate for August jobs typically is revised upwards.
- Labor market slack is building, but less quickly than a year ago, when the FOMC eased by 50bp.
- The upcoming easing cycle, however, will be prolonged; we still look for 150bp cut by mid-2026.
- ADP reports average monthly private payroll gains of 79K in Q3, up from 22K in Q2...
- ...But the link with the official data is loose and unstable; more reliable indicators remain weak.
- ISM and S&P services surveys point to a renewed rise in services inflation, challenging our base case.
- Home equity lending has grown considerably in recent years, but remains a shadow of its former self.
- Weak confidence, tight lending standards, and falling home prices suggest a big spending boost is unlikely.
- Fewer job openings than unemployed people for the first time since April 2021 will suppress wage growth.
- Near-real time data imply July’s 0.3% increase in real spending was followed by another solid rise in August...
- ...But spending has been stimulated by further tariff fears; real after-tax income growth is slowing.
- Households have exhausted their excess savings and a strong positive wealth effect is no longer in play.
- QCEW data up to Q4 2024 imply payrolls have been overestimated substantially; Q1 data will be weak too...
- ...But QCEW data are revised too; the preliminary estimate of the benchmark revision is usually too downbeat.
- The birth-death model has been too generous again; unauthorized workers also will be removed from the data.
- We look for a mere 75K rise in payrolls, despite the rebound in stock prices and decline in tariff uncertainty.
- Reliable surveys of hiring intentions have remained weak; consumers report worsening job availability.
- A rise in the unemployment rate to 4.3% in August is likely too, given the latest continuing claims data.
- Tariff revenues crept up by just $2B to $32B in August, but likely will reach $45B soon.
- Tariffs have risen this month; imports from high tariff nations will rebound; the de minimis exemption will end.
- We doubt the jump in underlying durable goods orders in July is a sign of things to come.
- Chair Powell’s Jackson Hole speech flags a September easing, with more cuts likely to follow.
- High long-term Treasury yields reflect policy risks rather than the Fed losing its inflation credibility…
- …We think the Trump administration should step back and let the FOMC do its job.
Price pressures are building, but July's data overstate the intensity.
- Growth in consumers’ real spending has stabilized following in sharp slowdown in H1 2025...
- ...But the labor market is set to remain weak, and most of the uplift to prices from tariffs lies ahead.
- We think spending will grow only at a meager 1-to-1½% pace in second half of this year.
- We estimate the core PCE deflator rose by 0.26% in July; most relevant PPI components rose modestly.
- The rise in distributors’ margins in the PPI is implausible, given surging tariff revenues and CPI data.
- We think hopes for a near-term “reshoring boost” to manufacturing look misplaced.
- We estimate that AI-linked investment lifted GDP growth in H1 2025 by about half a percentage point.
- The aggressive capex plans of the big tech firms suggest a similar boost in the coming quarters.
- July's PPI data likely will show that retailers’ and wholesalers’ margins are being squeezed by tariffs.
- Pass-through from the tariffs to consumer prices slowed in July, but will re-accelerate in the fall.
- The rebound in airline fares has further to run, but services inflation otherwise looks set to moderate.
- The FOMC likely will ease policy next month, despite more tariff-led inflation, to support the labor market.
- Adobe and PriceStats data point to a slowing passthrough from the tariffs to consumer prices...
- ...But the ISM services survey sends the opposite signal; we are taking the middle position.
- Demand for air travel seems to be recovering, but hotel room rates likely are sustainably lower.
- This year’s consumer slowdown has little to do with worries about taxes, more with trade and tariffs.
- The recent recovery in sentiment reduces recession risk, but the outlook for spending still is dim.
- Rising continuing claims reinforce the idea that the labor market has loosened materially.
- Swings in home prices have a far bigger dollar-for-dollar wealth effect than movements in stock prices.
- Ongoing weakness in the housing implies a trivial boost to consumption from asset prices in H2 2025.
- Labor-matching efficiency is impeded slightly by high new mortgage rates, but is comparable to the 2010s.
