Greenspan continues to peddle the prospect of a possible-not-probable recession by end of year

Bloomberg has an article entitled "Greenspan Says U.S. Recession Possible, Not Probable (Update3)" which reports on Greenspan speaking again via satellite video link, this time to a private conference in Tokyo that was not open to the media. The reports about the conference are all based on notes made by attendees.

One attendee's notes had Greenspan saying "By the end of the year, there is the possibility, but not the probability of the U.S. moving into recession."

So, what does that really mean? I suspect that it means that Greenspan believes that the probability of a recession by the end of the year is greater than zero but less than 50%.

Well, this is a whole new ballgame for Greenspan, not to mention the people who attempt to interpret was every word.

I feel that Greenspan has screwed up bigtime... by agreeing to speak in closed forums that are not directly accessible to the media, with no transcripts, and no copies of prepared remarks, where garbled fragments of his words get leaked inconsistently. No good can come from this misguided approach to communications, even for Greenspan himself. I suspect that he will soon grow tired of being misinterpreted and constantly needing to clarify the multitude of garbled representations of his words.

-- Jack Krupansky