There is only one reliable indicator that an economy is heading for recession, and the only country where it might be flashing red is in Australia, an ex-US Federal Reserve economist says. 
Markets have been thrown into a panic this year as investors struggle to interpret savage moves in prices across equity, commodity and currency markets.
A central worry is that spiking bank credit default spreads, ailing US corporate profits, and stress in junk bond markets are all symptoms of a global economy heading into recession.
A group of researchers at the US central bank in New York spent five years looking for a predictor of financial crises, and they found only one: bank lending standards.
"It's the simple idea that the cost of credit is not what suffocates an expansion, it's the availability of credit," Dr Robert Gay, managing partner at Fenwick Advisors, said at an investment forum on Tuesday.
"As long as you can roll over the principal at whatever price, things don't shut down," My Gay said. "Finance lubricates growth and when you stop the lubrication, you stop rolling over debt, then it becomes contagious."
There is no sign that lending standards in the US - where banks are still lending "like wildfire" - and Europe are heading higher, the New York-based Mr Gay, who served as a senior economist at the Fed under the chairmanship of Paul Volcker, said.
In fact, "there is only one country where the line is going up, and that's in Australia".
Of course, no indicator is perfect, but it's the best we have, Mr Gay said.
He pointed to anecdotal evidence that banks are tightening standards in response to increased regulation, although how far lending conditions need to tighten before they start posing a substantial risk to the economy is an open question, but one regulators are sure to be asking.
So what can policy makers do in a low-growth, low-inflation world?
"Not much," Mr Gay said. "People talk about 'diverging central banks' [with the US Fed tightening and others, such as central banks in Europe, Japan and China loosening], but policies are converging - five years from now we'll all be around [real rates] of zero."
The "key swing factor" is around fiscal policy, Mr Gay said, with China, US, Europe and Japan "leaning slightly towards fiscal stimulus which should give this expansion more time".
"It's the only reason to be somewhat hopeful for the year ahead."