Peter Boockvar

Positives The Philly April manufacturing index rose slightly to 23.2 from 22.3 and that was 2.2 pts above the forecast. The internals though were much more mixed with new orders, backlogs and inventories down while the labor market components were up. Of note, Delivery Time rose to the highest level ever since this survey began in 1968 and this reflects a …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 4/20

Positives Depending on one’s view this could also be seen as a negative: in the FOMC minutes they said “A number of participants indicated that the stronger outlook for economic activity, along with their increased confidence that inflation would return to 2 percent over the medium term, implied that the appropriate path for the federal funds rate over the next …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 4/13/18

Positives While I’m not supportive of the means, we hope the ends to the tariff threats is an agreement with China over US IP. ADP said private sector job growth over the past 3 months has averaged 243k and with a 6 month average of 203k. Over time though it matches with the BLS as the 12 month average is 192k vs 187k in the BLS private sector component. In …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 4/6/18

Positives Private sector income growth rose .5% m/o/m and follows gains of .6%, .5% and .6% in the 3 months prior. This is a definite quickened pace of wage gains but at least in February was mostly driven by a large 2% m/o/m rise in manufacturing after a 1.1% gain in January. The y/o/y private sector income rise was 4.8% and marks the 5th straight month of above …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Short Week’s Events – 3/29/18

Positives 1) The Fed hiked interest rates, continuing its slow drag of taking the fed funds rate ever closer to the rate of inflation. 2) The steel tariffs are getting watered down with the exemptions totaling about 70% of the initial target. 3) Core durable goods orders in February surprised to the upside with a 1.8% m/o/m jump, double the estimate of up .9%. …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 3/23/18

Positives Initial jobless claims totaled 226k, 2k less than expected and down from 230k last week. The 4 week average fell a touch to 221,500k from 222,500k. Continuing claims, delayed by a week, rose by 4k. The NFIB small business optimism index improved again in February as it rose .7 pts m/o/m to 107.6. By .1 pts it is at the best level since 1983. Current …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 3/16/18

Positives The BLS said 313k net jobs were created in February, well more than the estimate of 205k and the two prior months were revised up by a net 54k. The household survey saw a job gain of 785k which was about matched by an increase of 806k in the size of the labor force, the biggest one month rise since January 2000. Of the 785k, 446k came from the important …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 3/9/18

Positives While Jay Powell is left holding the bag of finishing the rate hike cycle and also overseeing most of QT, he was measured in his responses and boring as he should have been this week in front of the Senate and House. The February ISM manufacturing index rose 1.7 pts m/o/m to 60.8 and that was above the estimate of 58.7. It’s at the best level since …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 3/2/18

Positives Initial jobless claims totaled 222k, 8k less than expected and down from 229k last week. The 4 week average fell to 226k from 228k and that is just off the lowest since 1973. Continuing claims, delayed by a week, fell by 73k to also near the lowest since the early 1970's. The Markit US manufacturing and services index for February did improve by 2.1 …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 2/23/18

As I'm traveling this morning, this is going out early and thus will not include housing starts, import prices and consumer confidence. Positives The NFIB small business optimism index for January rose 2 pts to 106.9 after falling by 2.6 pts in December. It is the 2nd best print in this expansion. Plans to Hire was unchanged in part because Positions Not …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 2/16