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Since 4/2003, the Equal-Weighted S&P 500 Index, where each firm is roughly 1/500 of the index when each quarter starts, returned an annualized 11.65% average return, versus 11.34% for the S&P 500 Index. But investors invest in funds that track…

While the wage gap between the sexes has somewhat narrowed, a sizable gap endures. The top economist in the field, Nobelist Claudia Golden, suggests it’s all motherhood. A new and brilliant study looking at women with Mayer-Rokitansky-Kuster-Hauser Syndrome confirms it.…

The Friday File: The recently concluded Olympics saw 29 nations win at least one medal across a record 116 events. Norway stole the show. It won 18 golds, breaking the 2022 record of 16 set by Norway, and it won…

In 25Q4, the aggregate delinquency rate across all debt types was 4.8%, up from 4.5% Q-o-Q. This is the ninth quarterly increase in the past 10 quarters. The rate bottomed out in 22Q4 at about 2.5%. More significantly, the rate…

In 2025, new home sales totaled 679,000, 1.1% below the 2024 figure, and in December sales were up just 3.8% Y-o-Y. As for housing starts, they totaled 1,358,700 in 2025, down 0.6% from 2024. December starts were down 7.3% Y-o-Y.…

January employment growth was recently reported as 130,000. It’ll be revised, down. Last year, every initial monthly net job growth number was revised down. For example, 1/25 was initially reported at 143,000, the final number was -48,000. In CY25, the…

Although 25Q4 GDP was just 1.4%, half of what was expected (and down from an unsustainable 4.4% in 25Q3), the government closure knocked off 1.2 percentage points. If you remove trade, inventories and government, 25Q4 growth was 2.4% and for…

The Friday File: 2026 is the year of the horse based on the Chinese zodiac. Since 1950, horse years have averaged a return of 6.3%/year, placing it 9th out of the 12 signs. The best is the goat, or shall…

In a shockingly outlandish and unprecedented move, director of the National Economic Council, Kevin Hassett, the same guy who was short listed to be Fed Chairman, has suggested that four economists (two of whom are acquaintances) should be disciplined (really?)…

AI is simultaneously creating pricing power and eroding it. In addition to the uncertainty surrounding future cash flows to the hyperscalers, LLMs are extending Big Tech’s dominance by automating and compressing margins for software as service providers (think Adobe, Salesforce…).…