Tag Archives: Hot Topics

New home sales: a bright spot in the housing indicators  – by New Deal democrat New home sales are very noisy, and are heavily revised, which is why I pay more attention to single family housing permits. But they do have one important value: they are frequently the first housing indicator to turn at both tops and bottoms. And it increasingly looks like new home sales have already made their bottom for this cycle. In January they rose a...

Strong upward revisions push real personal income to new highs, put 2 important coincident indicators firmly in expansion territory  – by New Deal democrat Almost all of the news in this morning’s release for personal income and spending for January was positive. Nominally, personal income rose +0.6% and personal spending rose 1.8%. The deflator also rose +0.6%, making real personal income close to unchanged, and real spending (after...

The “gold standard” of jobs data shows a strong rebound in Q3 2022  – by New Deal democrat The preliminary estimate for the Q3 2022 QCEW was released yesterday. Although the monthly nonfarm payrolls report gets all the glory, it is only a survey. The QCEW is an actual census of the roughly 95% of all businesses paying unemployment insurance. It is reported with about a 6 month delay, and is not seasonally adjusted. The bottom line is while...

Initial claims continue recent excellent streak  – by New Deal democrat Initial jobless claims continued their recent excellent reports, as there were only 192,000 new claims, down -3,000 from the week before, and close to their 50+ year lows of last March and April. The 4 week average increased 1,500 to 191,250, still an excellent number. Continuing claims, with a one week delay, declined -37,000 to 1,654,000, still in their slightly elevated...

There are two good articles to be read here. Most is drawn from The Atlantic article and the other from The Detroit News. Some of the information is pulled from other articles to which the links are in the article. EVs may be the wave of the future. I think we will need better technology to power the electric vehicles and also lessen the energy pollution needed to make them. “Electric Vehicles Are a Status Symbol Now,” The Atlantic, Andrew...

The long leading forecast through year end 2023 at Seeking Alpha  – by New Deal democrat Normally in late January I update my top-line long leading forecast for the entire year. A little late this year, it is now up at Seeking Alpha. If you follow my updates on the leading indicators, the result isn’t very surprising. The twist is that recessions are almost always much shorter than expansions, so the long leading indicators turn up on a...

Existing home sales and prices decline further, BUT . . .  – by New Deal democrat Even though existing home sales make up about 90% of the total market, they have much less economic impact than new home construction. They are best used to confirm trends. In January they continued to confirm that sales have continued to decline, and prices, which follow sales with a lag, have joined in. January sales declined another -0.7% to 4.2 million...

Calculated Risk: MBA: “Mortgage Delinquencies Increase in the Fourth Quarter of 2022” calculatedriskblog.com, Bill McBride by Calculated Risk on 2/16/2023 01:42:00 PM From the MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increase in the Fourth Quarter of 2022 The delinquency rate for mortgage loans on one-to-four-unit residential properties increased to a seasonally adjusted rate of 3.96 percent of all loans outstanding at the end of the fourth quarter of...

This is a long one and a C&P. Other than putting it up at Angry Bear, I can not take credit for this one. What I can say is . . . they are not the first ones to accuse Supply Chain for much of the inflationary issues we have had as a nation. In 2008, automotive cut production and did not maintain orders with the supply base. When it started back up, we were chasing semiconductors, etc. Lead-times doubled. We have just gone through similar....

The President, Joe Biden, talking about the economy. In many ways, he made the right moves in protecting us from a reoccurrence of a similar 2008 event. This came after WallStreet blew up the economy by gambling, could not ante up, and government did not put enough on the table to rescue the economy. Main Street paid . . . February 15, 2023, Letters from an American, Prof. Heather Cox Richardson President Joe Biden hit the road today to...