After a big optimistic jump in new orders in September there is a slight down tick in both survey categories. So, a few more respondents reporting decreasing activity. Activity isn't increasing, but the small change doesn't indicate deterioration. Status quo until next month's releases. Disclaimer: This information is presented for informational purposes only and does not constitute an [...]
The growth rate of income and consumption are at healthy levels. But there are some aspects of the growth I'd like to point out. Though we have healthy rates of growth, the concern is that both incomes and consumption are slowing. I know we had excess savings from government transfers to the private sector. But we also had excess spending [...]
If we look at inflation on a year over year basis, the data series is smooth and it is coming down. The rate of decent has slowed, but that's ok, the world doesn't work in perfectly smooth arcs and waves. The month over month annualized rate is a shorter term (very volatile) rate. As such, it will lead when there [...]
Here's a good visual of the K-shaped recovery from the pandemic. This is top the 1/3 in income versus the bottom 1/3 (terciles). The K would likely get even more distinct if we looked at quartiles, quintiles and deciles. Disclaimer: This information is presented for informational purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell, or the [...]
Sales firmed to an annual rate 16.23 million units in September after dropping below 16 million in August. This is about 7% higher than the historic average. Buyers delayed purchases because of price spikes and lack of inventory. The more interesting and important data are the production and inventory numbers. Production continues to rise as companies try to re-build inventory. [...]
Measures of inflation GDP price deflator: 3.24% Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) Price Index YoY: 3.43% Core PCE (ex-Food and Energy): 3.9% All well above 2% target. All have been coming down. Disclaimer: This information is presented for informational purposes only and does not constitute an offer to sell, or the solicitation of an offer to buy any investment products. None [...]
GDP came in hotter than expected. Sequentially, Real GDP grew 4.9%. To say it another way, the annualized growth rate of the quarter over quarter change in GDP, or (Q32023/Q22023)^4. The reason to look at it on a QoQ annualized basis is that you would see a problem in the economy sooner than the YoY numbers. The yoy annual rate [...]
This is a canary in the coal mine series. All Clear. How good are these low levels of claims? We didn't have this few people claiming unemployment from 1969 to 2018. If I had to nitpick something, continuing claims have risen some, perhaps an indication that jobs are a bit harder to find. But there's no doubt that companies are [...]
New orders for Durable Goods looks good on the surface, up 4.7% just from last month and 7.8% from a year ago. The headline number showed an increase of $13.215B. Non-defense aircraft orders were up $15.5B, so the aggregate of everything else was down on the month. New Orders for Sep. Nondefense Capital Goods ex-Aircraft is a good proxy [...]
Prices peaked in Oct 2022 and came down about 9% by May 2023. People took advantage of the lower prices and sales went up in the 3rd quarter. As such, prices are up in the 3rd quarter. There are about 35% more units for sale than the historic average. About 2/3 of these units are currently under construction. Completed inventory [...]
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