Business investment has played an integral role in hopes that a
bustling U.S. economy would light the way for the rest of the world in
2015.
Tumbling gas prices, a newly resurgent U.S. dollar and a weak-spending consumer have taken considerable luster off that picture.
In fact, companies reporting quarterly earnings are predicting not robust times ahead but rather tepid profit growth, with a cornerstone of those forecasts being a drop, not a rise, in capital expenditures, or capex.
Goldman Sachs lowered its capex forecast from a gain of 6 percent to a decline of 3 percent, a stunning turnaround that the firm attributed primarily to weakened energy companies that have suffered from oil's decline. The number represents the worst figure since the financial crisis days of 2009.
"We expect total energy capex will collapse by 25 percent in 2015," Goldman said in a report for clients. "The sector accounts for 33 percent of S&P 500 capex and should drag total S&P 500 capital expenditure growth into negative territory."
"Consumers appear to be somewhat fatigued in their spending patterns, pulling back noticeably at the end of the year despite lower gas prices," Lindsey Piegza, chief economist at Sterne Agee, said in a note. "In the end, low gas prices will provide only a temporary boost while the key equation in terms of long-term success remains organic job and sustainable income growth."
Read more: The $4 trillion question for the US economy
Tumbling gas prices, a newly resurgent U.S. dollar and a weak-spending consumer have taken considerable luster off that picture.
In fact, companies reporting quarterly earnings are predicting not robust times ahead but rather tepid profit growth, with a cornerstone of those forecasts being a drop, not a rise, in capital expenditures, or capex.
Goldman Sachs lowered its capex forecast from a gain of 6 percent to a decline of 3 percent, a stunning turnaround that the firm attributed primarily to weakened energy companies that have suffered from oil's decline. The number represents the worst figure since the financial crisis days of 2009.
"We expect total energy capex will collapse by 25 percent in 2015," Goldman said in a report for clients. "The sector accounts for 33 percent of S&P 500 capex and should drag total S&P 500 capital expenditure growth into negative territory."
"Consumers appear to be somewhat fatigued in their spending patterns, pulling back noticeably at the end of the year despite lower gas prices," Lindsey Piegza, chief economist at Sterne Agee, said in a note. "In the end, low gas prices will provide only a temporary boost while the key equation in terms of long-term success remains organic job and sustainable income growth."
Read more: The $4 trillion question for the US economy
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