The Carlyle Group, one of the world’s leading investment behemoths, published some important economic realizations on job creation and consumer inflation. They filled in when federal government data was unavailable because of a shutdown. That analysis—drawn from a huge global portfolio—shows a pronounced hiring slowdown. Importantly, it reveals important trends by sector.
Carlyle’s current portfolio comprises 277 active companies and 694 real estate investments. Despite its size, this rich data paints a complicated picture of the current and future labor market. Last month, the consultancy announced a net loss of 17,000 jobs. That was a drop from the 22,000 new jobs added during August. This drop signals weak payroll increases, in concert with other indicators that hiring is barely growing throughout the economy.
Combined with Carlyle’s extensive employer portfolio, which represents more than 730,000 employees across the globe, this gives us a unique lens into trends around employment. This second batch of recently released data helps fill the void created by the government shutdown. It offers incredible context when no official statistics exist. The preliminary results confirm prior releases that point to a deceleration in hiring trends.
Along with bad labor news, Carlyle covered consumer prices, highlighting a drop in inflation as energy prices fell by 3.8%. All other services but shelter spiked at 3.3%. This signals a profoundly uneven economic geography where the winners are doing very well, but the losers are not.
Carlyle went on to note that the under the hood GDP growth was quite strong. As of September, it was still accelerating – in fact, at a 2.7% annualized pace. That’s commendable given the continued hiring slowdown, though it is a sign of an increasingly dollar-sensitive and precarious economy. Business investment made encouraging news as well, accelerating by 4.8% on a three-month average annualized basis.
Even in times of uncertainty, Carlyle’s analysis reinforces the importance and value of utilizing alternative data sources. By leveraging its extensive portfolio, Carlyle provides critical insights that help bridge the information void left by government reporting disruptions.