Archive for July 2023

Rather than weaken in the face of steep increases in the Fed funds rate, the first estimate of 23Q2 GDP accelerated to an annualized seasonally and inflation adjusted rate of 2.4%, up from 2% in 23Q1 and down slightly from 2.6% 22Q4. Business investment and consumer spending led the way. While slowdown worries remain, recession…

The Friday File: Australian fitness guru Daniel Scali recently recaptured the record for the most pushups in one hour with an utterly amazing, and shoulder burning total of 3,249, or an astounding 54.15 pushups/minute! The previous record of 3,206 was sent in November 2022 by fellow Aussie Lucas Helmke, who broke the previous record of…

Yesterday, the Dow Jones Industrials Average rose for the 13th day in a row. The last time that occurred was on 1/20/87, almost 40 years ago. Had the Dow Jones risen today it would have been the 14th day in a row and that would have been the longest streak since June 1897. Alas, it…

To the surprise of no one, the Fed raised the Fed funds rate 25bps to the highest rate in 25 years. As for future hikes, the Fed has retained complete optionality. Chair Powell said they might raise rates at the next meeting, or the one after that, or maybe not. Had it been otherwise financial…

Electric-vehicle sales were 3.2% of U.S. vehicle sales in 2021 and 5.8% of sales in 2022. In 2023 they will reach 7.5% of sales and in 2024 easily 12%. This is because total vehicle sales are flat. From 2000-2022, sales averaged 16 million/year. Conversely, electric-vehicle sales have jumped from 40,000/month in mid-2021 to 100,000/month in…

YTD, $1,000 invested in each of the 30 firms in the Dow Jones Industrial Average would now be worth $32,488, a gain of 8.29%. The firm with the best performance is Salesforce, with that original $1,000 now worth $1,720, followed by Apple at $1,482, Microsoft at $1,440, and Intel at $1,309. The worst performers are…

The Friday File: At present, 65% of Americans tip servers at sit-down restaurants, down from 75% in 2021. Servers in sit-down establishments are the most frequently tipped persons. Home repairmen are the least tipped at 10%. Data shows that women tip more frequently than men, and the likelihood of tipping increases with age. Coffee shop…

Looking back at changes in U.S. unemployment rate data since 1953, a period including 10 recessions, on average the unemployment rate has not noticeably changed during the 12 months leading up to a recession. Once the recession begins, however, the unemployment rate slowly rises and peaks 12 months later at a level three percentage points…

The stock market is signaling a soft landing, but the bond market is unequivocally predicting a recession. Similarly, manufacturing has been in recession for close to a year, but services are doing fine. Lastly, hard economic data such as construction activity and car manufacturing are improving while sentiment surveys of consumers and small business are…

While actors are believed to earn great sums, the vast majority don’t. 71% of actors earn less than $40,000/year versus 50% of working Americans. 14% of actors earn $40,000-$80,000/year versus 31% of Americans. 7% of actors, compared to 11% of the population at large earn $80,000-$120,000/year, and 3% of actors and 4% of employed persons…