Corporate U.S. Healthiest in Decades Under Obama With Lower Debt

[Purveyor]

By Thomas Black and Matt Robinson Oct 1, 2014 9:56 PM ET

Steve Wynn, founder of the Wynn Resorts Ltd. (WYNN) casino empire, once called President Barack Obama’s administration “the greatest wet blanket to business and progress and job creation in my lifetime.” Barry Sternlicht, chief executive officer of Starwood Property Trust Inc. (STWD), said Obamacare was driving down wage growth and “affecting spending and the desire to buy houses and everything else.”

They are among a chorus of corporate executives and lobbying groups that regularly assail Obama for policies that they say are stifling investment and hurting companies.

Corporate and economic statistics almost six years into his administration paint a different picture. Companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 (SPX) Index are the healthiest in decades, with the lowest net debt to earnings ratio in at least 24 years, $3.59 trillion in cash and marketable securities, and record earnings per share. They are headed this year toward the fastest average monthly job creation since 1999, manufacturing is recovering and the U.S. has returned as an engine for global growth. The recovery, which stands in contrast to weak growth in Europe and Asia, has underpinned an almost threefold gain in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index since March 2009.

Wynn has been part of that recovery. Since Obama first took the oath on Jan. 21, 2009, the shares of his luxury hotel company have surged fivefold while the S&P 500 Index more than doubled. Starwood Property Trust, Sternlicht’s Greenwich, Connecticut-based real estate company, has risen 36 percent since its August 2009 initial public offering, while an index of real estate investment trusts declined.

Accelerating Growth

“The U.S. is leading the way -- we’re the only major economy with accelerating growth,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist in West Chester, Pennsylvania, for Moody’s Analytics Inc. and a registered Democrat who has advised both the Obama administration and Senator John McCain, a Republican. “Obama deserves some credit for that, but he probably won’t get it.”

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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-02/corporate-u-s-healthiest-in-decades-under-obama-with-lower-debt.html

[unblock]

1. "healthiest" is a bit too judgmental for my tastes. i'd just say "least leveraged".

"least leveraged" is purely descriptive and factual.

but "healthiest"?

all around i see insufficient competition, companies refusing to share the benefits of increased productivity with workers and sometimes even customers, companies making money off of economic rents rather than genuine contributions to society, companies evading social responsibilities through tax avoidance, companies corrupting our politics through legalized bribery, and companies exploiting economic externalities by polluting and otherwise forcing costs onto third parties.

none of this is healthy.

arguably, the lowered leverage isn't particularly healthy either. sure, it tends to make the likelihood of bankruptcy more remote, but hoarding capital isn't exactly "healthy" either.