Archive for June 2017

The Friday file: Global alcohol consumption peaked in 2013 at 67 billion gallons. Last year, consumption declined to 66 billion gallons. The decline is pervasive. Per capita German and US consumption has been steadily declining for over 20 years; consumption in Brazil, China and Russia has been declining since roughly 2011. Last year, global beer…

The third and final estimate of 17Q1 GDP growth came in Thursday morning at 1.4%, a month ago the second estimate was 1.2% and two months ago the first estimate was just 0.8%; quite a difference. Three months after 17Q1 ended, the data is still being updated/revised. The moral, don’t take initial results as gospel…

Since at least 1/1/13, every $10 increase or decrease in the price of crude oil has resulted in an increase or decrease of 185 oil rigs across the US. Moreover, the impact is quite quick. This means if the recent $10 decline in the price of oil between 4/12/17 and 6/22/17 persists, it should soon…

With inflation rates and inflation expectations declining and the yield curve flattening, the Fed may find it more difficult than they thought to raise rates by one-quarter of one percent this coming September. If that’s the case, the Fed could instead begin to reduce the size of its balance sheet by $10 billion/month and wait…

While May housing starts rose 2.9% compared to April, 8.9% Y-o-Y, and 12.2% YTD, sales were weak in 16Q1 making comparisons easy. Critically, the median new home price surged 16.5% Y-o-Y to $345,800 while the average jumped 16.1% Y-o-Y to $406,400, both records. Moreover, since peaking in 15Q1, new homes have been shrinking; the median…

The Friday File: While the accounting is very dodgy, Uber’s revenues are up spectacularly, from $1 billion in 16Q1 to $3.4 billion in 17Q1, and gross bookings are up from $3.8 billion in 16Q1 to $7.5 billion in 17Q1. However, huge losses continue. In 2015, losses were minimally $2.2 billion, in 2016, minimally $3 billion…

With the unemployment rate at a 16-year low, faster growth requires getting people to work who are currently unwilling. To entice more women, targeted parental leave should be offered. For the elderly, reduce their income taxes by two percent for each additional year they work beyond 67. For youth, offer increased community college loan repayment…

Nine years after the government takeovers, there’s again talk of reforming Fannie and Freddie; good luck! Builders, Realtors, bankers, and investors want a strong government guarantee to backstop the $10 trillion mortgage market and keep the popular 30-year fixed rate mortgage. Democrats want money for affordable housing to be part of any fix, and Republicans…

There are 870 federal court judgeships with lifetime appointments. 122 are vacant, giving Trump the chance to appoint 13% of the judiciary, the second highest percentage an incoming first-term president has enjoyed dating back to at least 1969, a much less partisan era. Moreover, the median age of federal judges is 62.6 years, the highest…