Moynihan of Bank of America Believes that Rising Consumer Confidence will Delay the Next Recession

The American economy is still growing as long as consumers keep spending.

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According to CEO Brian Moynihan in an interview with Barron's, Bank of America Corp. is now forecasting a potential U.S. recession to come later than it had anticipated a few months ago as U.S. consumers continue to fuel strong economic activity.

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A slight recession could start as early as the second or third quarter of 2023, according to Moynihan, who also noted that the bank's research department now anticipates a return to positive growth in the second quarter of 2024.

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The bank's economic experts predicted that a recession would start as early as the fourth quarter of 2022 and last until mid-2023 during the third quarter of 2022.

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According to Moynihan, Bank of America's recession forecast at the time was more pessimistic than many other estimates made by prestigious corporations.

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The U.S. consumer "has kept spending up and kept the economic activity up and that's pushed it out," Moynihan said. But now the anticipation of a recession has advanced further.

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Moynihan stated in the interview with Trade Algo that "the customer drives a lot of the consumption." Businesses are available to fill that demand.

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In contrast to Wells Fargo & Co., Bank of America continued to hire during the fourth quarter. In addition to Goldman Sachs Group Inc., WFC, -1.14% of Jobs were lost by GS by 0.49%.

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The S&P 500 SPX has increased by 7.4% so far in 2023, outpacing the 7% gain in Bank of America's stock by 0.16%.