The continued release of increasingly bad data serves to further isolate the payroll report as something residing only of its own accord. There are far more relevant pieces of evidence that are clearly free of overly-dependent assumptions about factors that are less and less relevant to the actual economy as it exists post-crisis – and really post-2012. While the Establishment [...]
Lost amid last week’s stock euphoria was the collapse in both the ISM’s Chicago Business Barometer (which I covered here) and construction spending. While sentiment surveys are hard to judge, it wasn’t a huge intuitive leap to suggest that both data points may be related to the energy sector. While that will remain unanswered for Chicago, the construction figures are [...]
There were several updates in the crude oil data flow, including the latest “unexpectedly” huge increase in inventory that pushed spot WTI back below $50 yet again. The US EIA estimated that domestic inventory rose by a gargantuan 10.3 million barrels, far exceeding predicted builds. That figure has to include oil being shipped to the US to be stored in [...]
Stocks had a great day today unshaken by whether the manufacturing part of the economy was growing more quickly or at the slowest rate in 13 months. Confusion isn’t part of the asset inflation lexicon. In economic news, the U.S. manufacturing sector had its best gains since October, according to Markit's final Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index that rose to 55.1 [...]
The Great Recession was seven years ago so it might seem appropriate that our memories of the specific nature and order of events is lost to time. However, given that it will be a seminal event in history (hopefully not surpassed) there is less leeway to having such a short grasp on the important pieces. Part of that relates to [...]
Janet Yellen’s testimony concluded, no one gets any more clarity about what the FOMC actually thinks. However, that itself is in one sense an indication as she vacillated a little too much about making a firm commitment to either the recovery or “transitory” oil prices. QE3 ended months ago and we are seven years into this thing already, but there [...]
Crude oil futures have been quite volatile of late, particularly in the front months where even the slightest changes in expectations of whatever factor (rig counts, CEO comments, etc.) send WTI surging or tumbling by turn. Despite that, however, the outer years on the curve have seen not just more stability but a steady downward pressure of late. I think [...]
I sincerely look forward to the day, which I believe wholeheartedly will come, when scant attention is paid to whatever monetary officials make for official statements about official positions. The times being what they are, however, demand inconsistency be answered. That is especially true wherever the FOMC has taken not just to being the “lender of last resort” as supposedly [...]
The problem with a high rate of inventory build is that it eventually has to go somewhere. In an actual economic “boom” that isn’t much of a concern as businesses remain relatively confident that even if inventory is high in one month it will be easily disposed, profitably, in the next. That is the dominant narrative that seems to be [...]
At the same time the Bank of Japan cut its outlook for “inflation” last month, seriously violating the standard set at the beginning of QQE to meet its target within 2-years, they also raised their growth predictions for the coming fiscal year (starting in April). Nobody seems to have appreciated the irony of that since almost all of the increase [...]
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