Macro indicators

The price of borrowing money. The policy rate is set by the central bank, while Treasury yields are set by trading in the market. The yield spread is the 10-year yield minus the 2-year yield. A negative value means long-term yields are below short-term yields.

The rise in the consumer price index compared with the same month a year earlier. Core inflation leaves out volatile food and energy prices and is read alongside it to see the trend.

The share of people who want to work but have not found a job. Published monthly.

VIX is the expected volatility over the next 30 days priced into US stock index options. It tends to rise as uncertainty grows.

When USD/KRW rises, the won has lost value. The dollar index combines the dollar's value against major trading partner currencies, weighted by trade.

How to read this page

Macro indicators are not companies, so they cannot be graded from financial statements, and a high value is not good or bad in itself. Jupick gives them no grade or score and shows only the facts: the latest value, the change from the previous observation, the change from one month and one year earlier, and the position within the past year's range.

Every change is a difference in the indicator's own unit. When a rate moves from 4.50% to 4.70%, it is written as a rise of 0.20 percentage points (pp). Writing it as a 4.4% rise would describe the rate of change of the rate, not its level, which means something else.

Indicators are published on different schedules, so the values do not all refer to the same date. Treasury yields and exchange rates update every business day, while inflation and unemployment are released once a month, more than a month after the period. Each indicator therefore shows its observation date.

Data sources

Figures come from FRED, the public economic data service of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. The original publisher differs by indicator: the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System for the federal funds rate, Treasury yields, USD/KRW and the dollar index; the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics for consumer prices and US unemployment; the OECD for Korean unemployment; and the Chicago Board Options Exchange for VIX. The yield spread is calculated by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis from Treasury yields. Series names are listed on each indicator page. Indicators whose latest observation is far older than their release schedule are left out, so that a discontinued series is not shown as current.