Weekly indicators: summer doldrums edition

  - by New Deal democrat The monthly data for July released last week was almost all quite positive. Retail sales, industrial production, capactity utilization, and housing permits all rose quite strongly. Consumer sentiment rose slightly. As a result of permits, the Conference Board's Leading Index increased, exactly reversing June's decline. Consumer prices did not rise at all. Producer prices rose +.3. The only significant negative news was that both the Empire State and Philly regional manufacturing indexes both contracted....

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Not good enough

- by New Deal democratThree years ago I was arguing with Doomers on Daily Kos who thought that, as awful as things were, they were only going to get worse and worse as we fell into the bottomless abyss, quoting Zero Hedge and The Automatic Earth as gospel scripture that we were going to 25% unemployment and 1000 on the Dow Jones Indsutrial Average. Since then, I've countered the double-, triple-, and quadruple-dippers who have mistaken every spring slowdown for vindication. Over the last 9 months or so, I seem to have become the poster child...

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Stagnating wages are hurting the economy RIGHT NOW

- by New Deal democrat The global economic weakness that has intensified as this year has progressed has greatly tamped down inflation. If wages were growing at a reasonable rate, this would help jump-start demand. But wage growth has been declining for years, and is considerably worse than even during the Great Recession. As a result, even...

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Morning Market Analysis

The entire treasury curve continues its move lower.  All sectors have broken upward sloping tend lines and have bearish MACD formations.  Money is flowing out of the markets and volatility is increasing.  The next logical target is the 200 day EMA on the TLTs.The SPYs have moved to a six month high.  Momentum is rising, the...

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Finland Preparing For Eurozone Breakup

Erkki Tuomioja, Finland's Foreign Minister, has stated that Finland is preparing for the breakup of the Eurozone. He is quoted in the Telegraph:"Our officials, like everybody else and like every general staff, have some sort of operational plan for any eventuality."He wisely and honestly notes that the end of the Eurozone does not mean the end of the EU. Other politicians in the Eurozone would have us believe that the end of the Euro will sound the death knell for the EU, this is of course scaremongering nonsense.Kudos to Mr Tuomioja for...

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Bonddad Linkfest

The ugly presidential campaign (WaPo)US industrial production increases (FRB)Malaysian growth picks up (BB)FDI declines in 8 of the last nine months in China (BB)Brazilian unemployment still low despite slowing economy (FT)Despite evidence, farmers think warming temps are act of God (FT)Grain prices shouldn't impact overall CPI (Alphaville) Global growth stuck in twilight zone (Alphavil...

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Dude, where's my recession? Housing and Initial jobless claims

- by New Deal democratTwo piece of economic data released this morning make it considerably harder for bears to argue that we are slipping into, let alone already in, a new recession. Housing permits rose to 812,000. This is the first time over 800,000 and the highest level in 4 years. Permits have risen over 200,000 on an annualized basis over...

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Coincident economic indicators rise

  - by New Deal democratWe now know the values for July for 3 of the 4 indicators that the NBER uses to mark economic peaks and troughs.Nonfarm payrolls were reported up 163,000 for the month.  Further, their YoY growth has been acceleratiing slightly a compared with earlier this year.This morning Industrial production was reported at +0.6....

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Morning Market Analysis: Long-Term Europe Edition

The weekly Spanish chart shows the market may be making a bottom.  First, notice the depth of the sell-off; prices moved from 40 to about 21 for a drop of almost 50%.  However, prices have twice attempted to sell-off to the 20/21 area.  Also note the first sell-off was done on much higher volume than the second. The Italian market...

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Liborgate

Liborgate, despite the brief interlude provided by the chaff from the DFS over Standard Chartered, rumbles on.The BBC reports that seven banks (HSBC, Royal Bank of Scotland Barclays, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank, JPMorgan and UBS), are to be questioned in the US for alleged Libor manipulation.The US authorities will look to see if there is sufficient evidence to support a criminal prosecution.The coming weeks will see much behind the scenes haggling between the banks, the regulatory authorities and governments, in order to avoid this going to court....

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