The big shift in the mix for the Global Market Index (a proprietary benchmark that uses a passive weighting of all the major asset classes) over the past year has been a drop of nearly three percentage points for U.S. bonds and the same for foreign developed-market government fixed income. Meantime, the leading increase in relative terms for the 12 months through this past May has been a rise in the weighting for foreign-developed market stocks. As the table below shows, equities in mature markets added more than two percentage points to their collective allocation in GMI for the year through last month.

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I’m one of three panelists for tomorrow’s teleconference on using economic data to make informed investment decisions (4-4:45pm eastern, hosted by Focus). You can find the details for this event here. All are welcome to listen in and post questions.

Sluggish Hiring Seen as a Threat to Recovery
The Wall Street Journal | June 13
The potential for a persistent slowdown in hiring is the biggest threat to the U.S. recovery, according to economists in the latest Wall Street Journal economic forecasting survey, as they sharply cut the number of jobs they projected the economy would create in coming months… In the latest survey, the economists lowered their forecasts for second-quarter growth in gross domestic product to 2.3% at a seasonally adjusted annual rate—down from last month’s forecast of 3.2%. However, they see growth perking up to 3.3% in the second half of 2011.
Second Half 2011 U.S. Growth Rebound Intact, Economists Say
Bloomberg | June 10
Slowdowns in consumer spending and employment will prove temporary, giving way to a U.S. growth rebound in the second half of 2011, economists surveyed by Bloomberg News said. After growing at a 2.3 percent annual pace this quarter, the world’s largest economy will expand at a 3.2 percent rate from July through December, according to the median forecast of 67 economists polled from June 1 to June 8.

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