Tag Archives: Uncategorized

Decline in Profits Slows By Stephen Grocer Sept 12 (WSJ) — Analysts expect S&P 500 companies to report that revenue grew by 2.6% in the third quarter from the year-earlier period, according to FactSet. That would end a six-quarter period of sales contraction. Importantly, sales estimates for S&P 500 companies improved slightly since the third quarter began and companies began reporting second-quarter earnings. On June 30, analysts expected revenue to increase 2.5%,...

Did low interest rates contribute to the growth of tourism and tehrewith to higher aggregate demand? Yes. but not like the models predict. Lower rates on existing debts (instead of on new loans) fired the animal spirits of consumers (instead of producers). In normal times, Italy would have been hailed, by EU officials, as a beacon and an example of succesful development of one of its main sectors, tourism. Nowadays, the growth of employment in Italian tourism (+10% in three years, which...

from David Ruccio In a recent New York Times article, Quoctring Bui reveals some fascinating details about the geography of inequality in the United States—including the fact that  between 1990 and 2014, the states that we tend to think of as economic engines for the country — like New York, California and New Jersey — are the ones where inequality has grown the most.    But the author makes the mistake of repeating the common presumption that, prior to the new millennium (specifically,...

As previously discussed, this ‘nowcast’ is working its way lower as more data is released, much like it did last quarter. Still to come are weaker retail sales due to weakening car sales, weaker residential investment due to weakening housing permits, more inventory reductions due to weaker sales, and generally weaker consumption as employment growth continues to decelerate. And I also suspect the trade deficit to resume it’s climb as exports continue to weaken and the...

At this very moment (9 september 2016), arctic sea ice may have reached its yearly minimum extent. Does global warming cause a decline of this minimum? Business cycle economists use the phrase ‘months for cyclical dominance’: how many months does it take before trend movements are larger than monthly fluctuations of variables like consumption of exports? In the case of sea ice I used ‘years for cyclical dominance (YCD)’: a fourteen year moving average shows a continuous decline (the max....

from Dean Baker While Elizabeth Warren is praising the European Union’s crackdown on Apple’s Ireland tax scheme, Jack Lew and the Obama Treasury Department are going to bat for corporate tax cheating. Warren is far too optimistic about the prospect of a successful crackdown. These folks are prepared to spend a lot of money to hide their profits from tax authorities and they are likely to find accomplices in many Irelands around the world. It would be good to look in a different direction....

from David Ruccio I have been arguing for some time on this blog that contemporary capitalism faces a profound legitimation crisis. It has failed to deliver on its promises, and therefore is being calling into question. As it turns out, Martin Wolf, the chief economics commentator at the Financial Times, has also sounded a warning about the ongoing legitimacy crisis. But for him it’s a bit different. The problem, as he sees it, is the tension between democracy and capitalism. A natural...

Interesting how it peaked as oil capex collapsed;) Highlights Information revenue fell 0.1 percent in the second quarter compared to the first quarter. Information revenue in the first quarter is revised 1 tenth higher to plus 1.4 percent. Year-on-year, information revenue rose 3.8 percent in the second quarter vs an unrevised 5.7 percent gain in the first quarter. This is the beginning of the ‘revisions’ previously discussed. The govt. estimates jobs created by net new...

Look at how many more new applications there used to be when rates were double where they are now: Just an fyi, his logic makes no sense to me whatsoever: Fed’s Williams says U.S. economy in good shape, wants rate hike (Reuters) It “makes sense to get back to a pace of gradual rate increases, preferably sooner rather than later,” San Francisco Fed President John Williams said. Targeting low inflation, as the Fed and many other central banks currently do, simply will not work...

From: Erwan Mahé ‘Mr Draghi may have laid a fairly sophisticated trap to ensnare his most reticent colleagues.’. In a happy coincidence, the Fed and BoJ will hold their monetary policy meetings on exactly the same days, the 20th and 21st of September, with enough uncertainty in their decisions to reignite implied volatility in the preceding days! But we should, above all, focus on the ECB meeting, tomorrow, with speculation rampant about the possible changes Mr Draghi may announce in the...