It’s been a decent year, given the broader context

On the international front, a gradual softening of global economic activity continues to become more apparent.

For example, in the US this week,a gauge of manufacturing activity produced by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York fell to a 19-month low, which is just the latest in aline of indicators suggesting some softening of US economic activity, following on from a protracted period of above-trend growth.

One should not be concerned that the US economy is moving towards recession, but the stimulus given by the Trump tax cuts is definitely losing some momentum.

Having taken credit for and having so frequently boasted about his stewardship of the US economy against a background of surging US equity markets and a surging economy, President Trump is now clearly concerned that he will get credit for the more negative turnaround that is now obviously happening.

Hence, his broadside against the Federal Reserve in the run-up to its latest policy-making meeting this week — at which it raised interest rates but lowered its projection for more in 2019 to just two hikes.

Mr Trump is obviously moving early to apportion blame for any slowdown in the economy to theFederal Reserve.

This is worrying and pathetic behaviour and even somebody of Mr Trump’s mentality should recognise that going to war with the Federal Reserve is not a very sensible thing to do.

It is one thing to suggest that “Paris is burning and China is way down”, but to pick a row with the most important pillar of the US economic and financial system is folly in the extreme.

Equity markets are ending the year as they have behaved for the majority of the second half of the year — volatile, nervous, weak and threatening turmoil on a continuous basis.

US equity markets are still outperforming in a relative sense, but European and other global markets are threatening to end the year down by close to 20%.

It is certainly possible to state, without too much fear of contradiction, that the global economic and financial backdrop has been quite negative for much of 2018, at least relative to the very positive and synchronised cycle we experienced in 2017.

Ireland is standing out in marked contrast on many fronts.

The latest merchandise trade data show that, in the first 10 months of the year, the value of merchandise exports expanded by a very strong 14.3%.

Exports to the US increased by 17.7%; exports to the eurozoneexpanded by 20.1%, but sales to the UK declined by 4%.

The latter decline is quite remarkable in the context of a UK economy that has been under the hammer due to the ongoing lunacy that is Brexit, and a currency that although stable, has been persistently weak for the duration of 2018.

It says something about the resilience of that component of the Irish export sector that sells into the UK markets. Amazingly, the sales of food and live animals to the UK market actually expanded by 2.1% in the first 10 months. An examination of margins on that business might just give some cause for concern.

The third quarter overall growth numbers show that real GDP expanded by 7.4% in the first nine months of the year.

Consumer expenditure on goods and services increased by 3.1%and exports of goods and services expanded by 9.2%.

Annual growth in GDP in the third quarter eased to 0.9%, but given the volatility in Irish GDP numbers and their unpredictability, nothing too sinister should be read into that slow down just yet.

Modified domestic demand, which seeks to strip out the noise created by aircraft leasing, intellectual property and other nebulous multinational activities expanded by 4.5% in the first nine months, which is more aligned to the anecdotal growth environment that most of us observe and can relate to.

It has been a decent year for the Irish economy, but not a dramatic one.

This is a good result in the context of what is happening externally.