Economic Cycle

The Economic Cycle gauge answers "where in the business cycle is the U.S. economy right now?" — recovery, expansion, late-cycle, or contraction. It blends recession-risk indicators (yield curve, jobless claims, Sahm Rule, financial-conditions indices) with a half-weight contribution from the valuation models (stretched multiples bias toward late-cycle without double-counting). Each input is risk-aligned so "high" always means "more contractionary" regardless of whether the underlying series is high-good or high-bad. The four strongest historical recession signals (Sahm Rule, Yield Curve, Recession Probability, Initial Claims) carry double weight so the gauge fires even when slower indicators lag.