U.S. Economy Re-Accelerating as Delta Slows, Pimco’s Wilding Says

(Bloomberg) -- The economic recovery is gaining speed as the spread of the coronavirus delta variant abates, according to Pacific Investment Management Co.’s Tiffany Wilding.

“The economy actually is re-accelerating,” Pimco’s chief U.S. economist told Bloomberg TV’s Surveillance on Thursday. We are starting to see “a pickup in spending across leisure and travel services industries.”

An increase in the number of the Covid-19 cases has slowed as more people get vaccinated. Airline, hotel and cruise lines have all pinned their recovery hopes on a robust rebound in international and business travel next year, and were cheered by the recent U.S. decision to open its borders to vaccinated foreigners on Nov. 8.

Meantime, the recovery in key areas such as the U.S. labor market is making further gains. Initial jobless claims fell by 6,000 to 290,000 in the week ended Oct. 16, government data showed Thursday, marking the second period in a row below 300,000. Federal Reserve officials have signaled that they should start reducing emergency pandemic support for the economy this year.

“We expect net job gains in October to start to pick up when we get that report in a couple of weeks,” Wilding said. “This makes us more confident that monetary policy can kind of get on with its tapering business that we expect in November, and we can continue to recover from this pandemic.”

Wilding expects that growth likely will lead to more wage gains for workers, but that any resulting inflation will be measured.

“Inflation is likely to moderate by the end of next year,” she said, giving the Fed more room to keep interest rates on hold for a while. “We think that you probably get a rate hike in the beginning of 2023.”

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