On the left, the bar chart shows the U.S. real GDP year-over-year growth, along with the 10-year and 50-year average. Economic growth is a key component to corporate earnings growth and its strength and weakness also influences the U.S. Federal Reserve's monetary policy. This chart also shows that recessions in the U.S. are typically short, but sharp.

The right chart is the breakdown of the U.S. GDP by expenditure components. Consumption is the largest part of the economy but this tends to be relatively stable. Investment ex-housing reflects on the corporate behavior and its confidence on future business conditions. Hence, this tends to be more sensitive to interest rates and uncertainties. The U.S. runs a current account deficit so the contribution from net exports is typically negative.