Forex Flash: Flat US economic activity a product of seasonals? – Westpac

FXstreet.com (Barcelona) - Much has been made of supposedly biased US seasonal adjustment factors that have boosted jobs at the turn of the year in recent years before delivering softer outcomes into the middle of the year. According to the Westpac Strategy Team, “We are not so sure that the soft March US data is an artifact of faulty seasonals. If the seasonal adjustments are indeed biased they should if anything continue to flatter US activity for a couple more months”.

Close inspection of the US data between 2010 and 2012 suggest that supposedly faulty seasonals should not be produce a "soft patch" until May/June data. “We thus wonder whether sequestion may be the main culprit behind the almost universally weaker run of March data. If so, recent softer data is genuine and altogether more worrisome than biased seasonals.” they note.