ROSENBERG: 6 Key Economic Indicators Show That The US Isn't In Great Shape

By the end of 2012, once it was clear that the fiscal cliff would be avoided, the consensus was that the U.S. economy wrapped up the year in "some sort of accelerating trend", according to Gluskin Sheff's David Rosenberg.

But Rosenberg says there are telling signs everywhere that this isn't actually the case.

"Mortgage applications have fallen off a cliff of their own of late... What I am asking is that calendar quirks aside why on earth would railway car loadings, coal production, auto assemblies, raw steel output and port activity be contracting on a year-over-year basis if the economy is humming along as the consensus would have you believe?"

Here are the charts: