Is America now in recession, or within striking distance? DICK BOVE, chief financial strategist at ODEON CAPITAL GROUP, thinks so. As the US stock market skyrockets in anticipation of a series of interest rate cuts in 2024, BOVE sees huge trouble in sections of the US economy. Forget about the standard textbook definition of recession—two consecutive quarters of declining GDP—the cracks are already appearing. Negative equity on automobiles in America, for instance, is at the highest level in three years. (Two consecutive quarters of declines are not always applied in the designation of recessions today, according to MAT VAN ALSTYNE, recalling the most recent bouts of recession.)

While investors anticipate rate cuts, BOVE says the Fed has muddied the waters with conflicting communications from Fed Chair Jerome Powell, and separate comments by Fed governors. "Investors don't care, they see inflation has come down and they see rates coming down," he added.

BOVE is out with a new report. Who Owns the US Federal Debt? Who Will Pay For It? With the US National Debt at over $33 trillion and rising, deficit spending could hit some $2.2 trillion in fiscal 2023. Now foreign buyers of US Treasuries are scaling back, raising questions on who will step in. Meanwhile, the brutual war in Ukraine continues to grind on. "My view is that Russia is winning, " says BOVE, "not so much as in Ukraine but in the global financial system." Joining the CONVERSATION, our host, JOHN AIDAN BYRNE, outlines Putin's strategy for leveraging the exit of foreign companies from Russia to his advantange, a tax that has contributed to his nation's coffers.

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