Recession or Soft Landing? 6 Experts Weigh in on What's Next

Garofalo: Fed will have to slow ambitious hiking plans

So far in 2022 the Fed has hiked rates twice, with two more 50 basis point increases expected at its upcoming June and July meetings. The question for many market watchers is how far it will be able to get.

David Garofalo, CEO and chairman of Gold Royalty (NYSEAMERICAN:GROY), believes the central bank needs to find a balance between spurring economic activity and implementing measures to combat inflation.

“I think the Federal Reserve is going to be a lot more tentative because of the amount of debt at the sovereign and personal levels. If they raise nominal interest rates too high, that'll lead to stagflation, a deep recession,” he said. He expects a reversal from the Fed in the medium term, and ultimately believes a recession is unavoidable.

“A recession is inevitable, because we've gone through a dozen years or so since the credit crisis of excess in the system — in terms of excess money supply, low interest rates, extreme amounts of debt strapped on both the personal and sovereign levels,” Garofalo explained.

“There is going to be a reckoning — there's going to have to be deleveraging, which will lead to a slowdown in economic activity. That's why I think the Federal Reserve and the other central banks globally are going to have to reverse course in order to try to achieve a soft landing ... I think that's going to be very difficult to actually achieve.”

Hodge: US recession may already be here

This sentiment was repeated by Nick Hodge, editor of Daily Profit Cycle and co-owner of Digest Publishing. The precious metals and energy expert warned investors to be mindful of economic tallies that may look more promising than they really are, noting that the US may already be in recession territory.

“You're comparing GDP numbers from 2021 that were themselves being compared to lockdown numbers in 2020,” Hodge told INN. “So 2021 numbers looked very good because they were being compared to people locked in their homes; commensurately 2022 doesn't look good stacked next to 2021."

With the brunt of the pandemic now over, Hodge said it should be time for economic growth. “And it is, in fact, not growing,” the expert said. “Look at the supply chain, look at the labor shortages that we're facing, look at the prices that consumers are facing. You're very much headed into a recession, like I say, if you're not there already.”

Hodge also offered the definition of a recession as further proof that the US could be in one now.

“The classic definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative GDP growth, and you've had one already — we're smack dab in the middle of the second quarter,” he said.

Depending on the length of a potential recession, Hodge believes gold is poised to benefit, pointing out that the yellow metal performs adversely amid rising interest rates.

“You're in a period of tumult here. I would say you're waiting for the Fed to pivot (and) say, 'We can't raise as many times as we want to because we won't be able to pay off the debt.' Things are starting to break in the bond market, and the consumer can't take it," he said. “And I think at that point, you'll have gold take off in earnest.”

Rule: Bear market = buying opportunity

Rick Rule, proprietor of Rule Investment Media, also sees an opportunity where some may see chaos.

“You know, bear markets really are sales, and if you think that sales are good, then these are good,” said the veteran investor and speculator, who also warned that he is “approaching this one with caution.”

“(That's) because it's been a really long time since the markets have had a real crisis in confidence. And I'm no market forecaster, but part of me suggests this could get worse before it's going to get better.”

While encouraging bargain hunting, Rule did admit that the economy's trajectory has a recessionary tone.

“When you have an economy that has been as much a consequence of both liquidity and confidence as this one has, you're always nervous,” he said, joking that he has successfully called 17 of the last three recessions.

“It wouldn't surprise me to see a recession,” Rule said.

Tiggre: War, inflation and debt, oh my

While DiMartino Booth is concerned that the Fed won’t be able to steer the economy to safety, founder and editor of the IndependentSpeculator.com Lobo Tiggre has other concerns.

“If we get a recession, it doesn't have to be deflationary,” he said. “Because a lot of the recession camp has been saying, 'Well, that's going to bring prices down.' But what if it doesn't? What if you actually have this economic weakness and prices are still going higher?”

The economic effects of the war in Ukraine are also a factor that Tiggre sees having a significant global impact.

“The sanctions and economic war … are a big deal (and) are not going away,” he said. “So I think the possibility of a recession here instead of a stagflation, which is just kind of weak muddling along and high inflation, but actually, you know, retreating economic action, plus high inflation. I think that's a distinct possibility.”

Like DiMartino Booth, Tiggre explained that the negative Q1 GDP means the US is at least halfway there. “We'll see if there's a negative print in Q2 — that is officially a recession,” he said.

Although most of the experts INN spoke with have little faith that the Fed can navigate a soft landing, Jeffrey Christian, managing partner at CPM Group, advised investors to stay calm.

“You have people saying, 'Well, they're going to either kill inflation and throw us into a recession, or they're going to let inflation run,'” Christian told INN, adding that monetary authorities have spent the last four decades learning deeply about monetary policy management.

“It is quite possible that the Fed will succeed in quelling inflationary pressures, insofar as it's possible for the Fed to do that without throwing us into a recession,” he said.