U.S. shifts from recovery to expansion, decouples from globe

The global economy is currently seeing a divergence between the United States and the rest of the world, as the U.S. economy moves into expansion against a weakening global backdrop.

“The U.S. is one of the few bright spots in the world,” said Mike Acton, managing director of AEW Research, at an AEW research luncheon where he presented the organization’s current research findings and discussed the state of the economy and the property markets.

One of the main themes is that the U.S. economy is accelerating while the European Union, China and Japan are slowing. Acton identified the decoupling in growth, as well as monetary policy, as a reason for the divergence in yields between the two markets.

On the monetary policy front, the Federal Reserve is on track to normalize its monetary policy with the end of quantitative easing and the end of the Fed’s aggressive actions to stabilize the economy by buying up assets. But even as the