Meredith Whitney famously called the 2008 financial crisis
Nearly two decades ago, financial analyst Meredith Whitney earned the moniker as the “Oracle of Wall Street” for her bearish views on banks ahead of the global financial crisis.
The CEO and founder of the Meredith Whitney Advisory Group has been spotting trouble on the horizon again, saying the U.S. faces a “bifurcated economy” driven by the high-end consumer.
In a Tuesday interview with MarketWatch, Whitney stood by a prediction she made earlier this year, that over 50% of U.S. households – many living paycheck to paycheck – faced a second recession of losing jobs.
“To me, the weakest portion of the U.S. economy, which employs over 20% of U.S. workers, is hospitality and leisure,” she said. Those that jobs pay under $60,000, may see the biggest hits when jobs numbers worsen.
Whether or not consumers continue to spend comes down to home ownership, according to Whitney, who said homeowners increasingly began to tap into their home equity a little over a year ago, reversing a 17-year cycle of declining equity-home loans.
“So from a peak of around $700 billion, that went down closer to $250 billion to $240 billion and that’s now increasing. And home equity is actually the fastest growing loan category of any
US Homeowners haven’t drained cash out of their houses this fast since 2008
https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2024/10/us-homeowners-havent-drained-cash-out.html
Barbara Kollmeyer MarketWatch Aug. 20, 2025
Whitney is best known for predicting Citigroup would have to raise capital, sell assets on Oct. 31, 2007. CEO Chuck Prince quit two days later
https://englundmacro.blogspot.com/2024/04/whitney-is-best-known-for-predicting.html
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