70 Words
US crude oil inventories are at 29 days, their highest level since 1985, and are at 60% of storage capacity vs. 48% a year ago. In Cushing, OK (the delivery point for WTI futures contracts) inventories are at 77% of…
The Friday File: 25 years ago Wednesday, $500 million in paintings were stolen from the Gardner Museum in Boston, making it the greatest art heist. Other spectacular ones include the pilfering of the Mona Lisa from the Louvre in 1911…
With the recent sharp decline in energy prices, the percentage of household spending devoted to energy in Q4/14 was 4.9%, its lowest level since Q1/09. The last time it was below 5% for an entire year was 2003. The lowest…
In today’s press conference Fed Chairwoman Yellen told us the Fed might raise rates as soon as June, but then quickly backtracked playing the markets masterfully. She cited the strengthening dollar as hurting manufacturing and weakening inflationary trends. Moreover, while…
While housing starts were positively rotten last month, weather was a key factor. That said, permits are much less weather sensitive than starts, with a very small margin of error. While overall permits were up 4%, single-family permit activity was…
While the strength of the US dollar was for a long time the result of central bank policy in the US, the dollar is now, to at least some extent, a determinant of Fed policy. Because the surging dollar is…
The Friday File: While the NCAA college basketball tournament may or may not cost the economy money in lost worker productivity and sales, the sure losers are the 99% of Division I college players that don’t make the NBA. They…
After WWII, public transit use peaked at 23 billion unique trips, meaning that 20% of the US population took public transit twice a day. Public transit usage then quickly declined, hitting a low of 6.6 billion unique trips in 1972.…
With industrial output growing at its slowest pace since 2008, retail sales and fixed investment at levels last seen in 2005 and 2001 respectively, China is slowing. To boost lending, expect China to lower interest rates and the reserve requirement…
Many stores offer low-price-match guarantees. On the surface this protects consumers. But it can harm them too. Once convinced that a store will match a lower price, customers may not shop around to find better prices. Moreover, if multiple stores…