The Pulse

The state of money

• Fed Balance Sheet (Total Assets) 6,743,031 -24.8% from its all-time peak
• US 10Y-2Y Spread 0.45 lower than 303 of 1,072 readings, since 2022
• US Core CPI 2.76 lower than 421 of 823 readings, since 1957
• US Consumer Sentiment 51.7 lower than 670 of 676 readings, since 1952
• US 10Y Treasury Yield 5.24 lower than 4 of 1,072 readings, since 2022
• US Unemployment Rate 4.2 lower than 752 of 944 readings, since 1948
• Gold ETF (GLD) -4.9 over the last 30 days
• Bitcoin 8.05 over the last 30 days
• VIX Short-Term Futures ETF -3.28 over the last 30 days
• S&P 500 ETF (SPY) 0.48 over the last 30 days
• Europe ETF (VGK) -5.27 over the last 30 days
• EUR/USD (FRED daily) -1.95 over the last 30 days

Countries gaining attention

• Spain +37.0% 85 → 163 mentions

  Driven mainly by: Reina Sofía (Madrid) — 3 → 6; Guggenheim Museum Bilbao (Bilbao) — 8 → 5; Prado Museum (Madrid) — 6 → 4; Museo Picasso Málaga (Málaga) — 4 → 4.

• Switzerland +35.6% 88 → 167 mentions

  Driven mainly by: Kunsthalle Zürich (Zurich) — 1 → 5; Fondation Beyeler (Riehen) — 20 → 45; Art Basel (Basel) — 23 → 44; Kunsthalle Basel (Basel) — 4 → 4.

• France +12.9% 374 → 591 mentions

  Driven mainly by: Musée d'Orsay (7th arrondissement of Paris) — 43 → 90; Maison Européenne de la Photographie (4th arrondissement of Paris) — 7 → 9; École des Beaux-Arts — 5 → 9; Musée Guimet (16th arrondissement of Paris) — 4 → 8.

• Austria -22.0% 87 → 95 mentions

  Driven mainly by: Dorotheum — 7 → 7; Oberes Belvedere (Vienna) — 5 → 5; Belvedere (Landstraße) — 36 → 42; Kunsthalle Wien (Vienna) — 3 → 4.

• Italy -9.7% 239 → 302 mentions

  Driven mainly by: Villa Medici (Rome) — 9 → 9; Museo del Novecento (San Donato Val di Comino) — 2 → 8; Palazzo Grassi (Venice) — 3 → 7; Kaufmann Repetto — 0 → 6.

Themes on the move

• publication +196.1% 586 → 1,699 stories
• award +117.1% 135 → 287 stories
• institutional +96.1% 237 → 455 stories
• ai-technology -74.7% 3,145 → 778 stories
• artist -39.0% 697 → 416 stories

Side by side

Attention on Switzerland moved +35.6% over 30 days. Over the same period that country’s stock market moved -3.8%.

These are two measured facts placed side by side. We do not claim one explains the other.

How these numbers are calculated

Attention shifts compare the last 30 days with the 30 before. They are measured as a share of our archive total, not in absolute numbers: the archive grows, and in absolute terms everything would grow with it.

For countries we count mentions of their art institutions — museums, galleries, foundations, biennials, fairs, auction houses — excluding news outlets. Only countries with at least three institutions on record are included: one represented by a single museum would move on a single exhibition.

Financial data comes from the Federal Reserve (FRED), Finnhub and CoinCap. Each figure’s historical context is computed over the full available series, which for some starts in 1942.

This page describes the present and does not forecast the future. It asserts no causal relationship between financial conditions and attention shifts, and does not separate seasonal effects: with eight months of dense history, a forecast would be a bet dressed as data.