As promised, some more commentary, Courtesy of Nouriel Roubini, on why the Q1 GDP numbers are a contraction:

• The obvious one is that when inflation exceeds growth, fewer goods and services are bought or delivered, which is what has happened in the past 2 quarters.
• Increasing inventories of unsold resulted in a +0.8% to the GDP numbers, which is not economic growth, though it can lead to increased growth.
• My analysis of this tidbit is that this is actually increased hoarding of things people believe are inflating rapidly.
• Residential spending was recorded to have dropped an astonishing 26.7%, and that this number does not include cancellations on new homes, so it’s even bigger.
• Durable and non durable goods sales contracted.

Go read the whole thing.