Healthcare, Regulation comments, Policy statement

Looks like no repeal and replace pending: I think Paul Ryan is trying to pull a fast one on repealing Obamacare On the surface, it looked like a GOP news conference touting a possible compromise with conservatives to help get the health-care reform bill passed. But House Speaker Paul Ryan and his fellow Republicans really […]

Redbook retail sales, Pending home sales, Stock buy backs, Spending, Japan stocks, Bank regulation, UN resolution

This is the time of year when year over year growth tends to increase, pulling up the rest of the year’s growth. But note how that increase has declined along with the general increases: Along with what looks to me like Trumped up expectations actual sales remain depressed: Any expected Trump bump in home sales […]

Bannon, DB on repatriation, The $

The big stupid continues uninterrupted from regime to regime: Documentary Of The Week: Stephen Bannon Explains America’s Problems By John Lounsburry Nov 15 (Econintersect) — Econintersect: This lecture was presented to the inaugural session of the Liberty Restoration Foundation in Orlando, FL October, 2011. Stephen Bannon, the CEO of Donald Trump’s successful presidential campaign and […]

Unemployment claims, Online help wanted ads, Italian bank comment

Record lows, particularly population adjusted, for record periods of time, and no one even suggests it might be because they’ve become that much harder to get? Meanwhile, the consequence is less govt. spending than otherwise potentially making this recession that much worse: Note the peak was just after oil capital expenditures collapsed: The Italian bank […]

Factory orders, Small business borrowing, NY business conditions, Shadow lending, US jobs diffusion index

Worse than expected as another April gain reverts in May: US Factory Orders Fall More Than Expected New orders for manufactured goods shrank 1% mom in May, compared to a downwardly revised 1.8% gain in April. Figures came slightly worse than market expectations of a 0.9% drop. Meanwhile, orders for non-defense capital goods excluding aircraft […]

Mtg purchase apps, Pending home sales, Bank liquidity, Apple

Continues at depressed levels: MBA Mortgage Applications Highlights Purchase applications are not pointing to Spring acceleration for the housing sector, down 2.0 percent from the April 22 week with the year-on-year rate continuing to come down, to 14 percent from 17 percent. This rate was as high as 30 percent as recently as March. Refinancing […]

Corporate profits, Q4 GDP 3rd revision, Credit contraction and commercial property articles

Corporate Profits Highlights Held down by declines in the petroleum and chemical industries, corporate profits in the fourth quarter came in at $1.640 trillion, down a year-on-year 3.6 percent. Profits are after tax without inventory valuation or capital consumption adjustments. Revised up, but seems the odd looking spike in ‘recreational services’ that alone added most […]

Euro banks, Fed’s labor market index, NFIB chart

Getting more obvious it’s ‘spreading’ much like during the sub prime days, as previously discussed? European banks face major cash crunch European banks may have to pare down assets to bolster capital reserves as cheap oil is taking a toll on portfolios of energy-exposed loans. It’s slowing, whatever it is… ;) Labor Market Conditions Index […]

Weather comment, oil capex reductions, NFIB small business index

This time the warm weather is cited for the weakness as utility spending fell. Yes, capitalism is about sales, and unspent income reduces sales, unless other agents spend more than their income, etc. etc. And with the private sector in general necessarily pro cyclical, unspent income stories beg fiscal adjustments, which at the moment are […]

Spending and tax bill, Chicago Fed, CRE lending

800 billion over 10 years is something, but not enough to turn things around as it’s maybe .25% of GDP per year or so. Historically it’s taken a good 5% of GDP deficit to reverse a decline, which today means close to a 1T deficit annually. And interesting how they just jumped all over Trump […]