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Positives 1)The pace of virus spread is slowing in Asia.  2)Central banks are flooding the world with money in order to grease markets and ease funding concerns.  3)The broad shutdowns are economically damaging but needed in order to slow the rate of spread and give time for millions of test kits to arrive.  4)For the week ended March 7th, initial …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events: – 3/13

Positives 1)Business activity in China is slowly coming back. In a BN story, online travel company Tongcheng-Elong Holdings said “Hotel bookings in the week to March 1 surged 40% from the previous week, while peak daily bookings for domestic flights soared 230% from the lowest level recorded in February…Bookings for domestic flights in June jumped 250% in the …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 3/6

Positives 1)The February Chicago manufacturing index rose to 49 from a depressed 42.9 in January. The estimate was 46. In the 1st special question “Will the signing of the Phase 1 deal with China/Epidemic have any impact on your business? The majority 45.7% reported little impact, while 30.4% noted no impact at all and 23.9% mentioned a large impact.” The …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 2/28

Positives 1) Initial jobless claims totaled 210k, exactly as expected and up 4k from last week. As a print of 223k dropped out of the 4 week average, it fell to 209k from 212k last week. That's the lowest since last April and continues to point to a very benign environment with respect to the pace of firing's. Continuing claims, delayed by a week, rose by 25k …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 2/21

Positives 1)The preliminary February UoM consumer confidence index ticked up by 1.1 m/o/m to 100.9, just shy of the highest in this cycle. The estimate was 99.5. The components were mixed as Current Conditions fell by .6 pts m/o/m but was offsets by a 2.1 pt rise in Expectations. One year inflation expectations held at 2.5%. The Net Income component jumped 10 …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 2/14

Positives 1)Helped by weather and the construction trade, payrolls in January grew by a net 225k, 60k more than expected and the two prior months were revised up by a total of 7k. The private sector added 206k of that. On the flip side, the household survey saw a net loss of 89k led by jobs lost in the key 25-54 age group and when combined with the 50k person …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 2/7

Positives 1)The final January UoM consumer confidence index did rise by .7 pts to 99.8 which was better than the initial print of 99.1 and up .5 pt from December. The components though were mixed as Current Conditions fell 1.1 pts while Expectations were higher by 1.6 pts. Inflation expectations out one year were 2.5% vs 2.3% in December and 2.5% in November. …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 1/31

Positives 1)The US services PMI for January rose .4 pts m/o/m to 53.2, the best since March 2019. “The expansion in new orders moderated slightly.” but, employment rose and “Service sector firms signaled an improvement in business expectations, as the degree of optimism reached a 7 month high. However, business confidence remained well below the series trend.” With …

[Read more...] about Succinct Summation of the Week’s Events – 1/24