Two questions describe most of the macro backdrop for a portfolio: is output accelerating or slowing, and is price pressure rising or falling. Plot one against the other and you get four quadrants. Which one you are in says more about what tends to work than any single indicator does.
Loading the current reading. Each point is one month. The quadrant frame above is the framework; the plotted path comes from a snapshot refreshed monthly.
Why the direction matters
Inflation at 3% tells you little on its own. Inflation at 3% and decelerating is a different world from 3% and accelerating, and portfolios behave differently in each. The same holds for growth. Reading both as rate of change is what turns two noisy series into a position on a map.
What this does not do
It does not forecast. The plot shows where the economy has been as of the latest published data, which lags by a month or more, and offers no view on where it goes next. Use it as context for reading a portfolio. It is not a trading signal.
Built from two public FRED series: industrial production and consumer prices. Free to read, no account needed.