Joe Quinlan, MD and Chief Market Strategist at US Trust-Bank of America Private Wealth Management in New York, discusses the following issues:

- US GDP figures will be announced on 30th July and consensus estimates are at 1.1%(real GDP) down from prior figure of 1.8%. This is quite a big fall from earlier expectations.. And these declines are coming from personal consumption. Your view? 

- Can growth realistically accelerate to the 2.3-2.6% expected by the Fed in 2013? Let alone the 3-3.5% in 2014? – this is significantly above the trend growth rate of 2.1% experienced since 2009. 

- Consumer confidence - Consensus estimate is at 81.0, slightly lower than prior figure of 81.4 but still a strong indication of consumer confidence. BUT the gain masks a small uptick in those who say jobs are hard to get, now at 36.9 percent for a 5 tenths increase that does not point to new gains for the June employment report.Your view? 

- And to the debt ceiling - Treasury Security, Jack Lew, predicted that the US would hit its statutory borrowing limit ($16.7 trillion), sometime after Labor Day (1st Monday on Sept) Will the Democrats and Republicans will be able to get it right this time? 

- Or are we going to see another ‘last minute fix’?

- Japan has just recorded its highest level of inflation in 5 years with the core consumer price index rising to 0.4%, but this was largely due to Yen weakness, which has made imports more costly However, the prices of food, housing, household goods and entertainment in Japan all fell on the year - this makes the numbers pretty artificial?

- Farther out, how do u rate Abe's target for Japan to win its 15 year battle with deflation, and hit its target of 2% p.a.?

- Over the past four days the Nikkei has dropped c. 1,000 points, and the JPY has seen its biggest surge in over six weeks… Is something rotten in the state of Abenomics? And Is the long Nikkei/short JPY trade over for now? 

- Reports say President Barack Obama may be leaning toward former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers as the next head of the Federal Reserve, and not the dovish Janet Yellen What's your view of these reports? And if Summers is indeed selected how badly could it jolt markets, since tapering will be expected to happen more quickly?

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