the interesting things about the rebound in rail traffic is that it typically takes about 4 weeks from trough to recovery to previous year levels. In 2012 it has taken only two. While a steep recover y in rail traffic from the Christmas weeks lows is normal, it does not usually slingshot so hard. Significant strength is in the auto segment where shipments rose 50% over the previous week. Metals (think manufacturing) also rose over 10% to the upper end of the 2011 range.
When we couple this with yesterday’s temp employment report, I still maintain Q1 2012 is shaping up better than most predicted a couple weeks ago. I expect to see upwards revisions to GDP numbers coming in over the next few weeks.
