From the category archives:
The Federal Reserve continues to face an ugly dilemma: The growth
numbers don’t look good, but the inflation numbers are off the charts. That trend
continued into May, according to the latest figures from the University of Michigan. The group’s confidence index
dropped to 59.5 from 62.6 in April. That’s the lowest reading since June 1980. Indices that [...]
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The Bureau of Labor Statistics told us the other day that gas prices are down. The Fed has been
blathering on for months about how inflation is “contained.” Unfortunately, here in
RealityLand, that doesn’t fly. In fact, there’s a great story in
the Washington Post today about how gas prices are rising so quickly that some older gas [...]
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This week is a biggie on the inflation front, with import price data out this morning
and the Consumer Price Index coming tomorrow. So what did the April numbers show? That import inflation is simply out of control. Consider:
* Import prices jumped 1.8% on the month, bigger than the
1.6% increase that economists were expecting. More importantly, [...]
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Late yesterday, we got some startling statistics. In the month of March, consumer credit outstanding (auto loans, credit cards, and other non-real estate loans) surged $15.3 billion. That was the
biggest rise since November and much more than the $6 billion economists were expecting. In fact, consumers took out
$34 billion in consumer loans during the first [...]
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It’s been a
busy day on the data front. Here’s the scoop on today’s batch of news …
* Q1 GDP managed to come in positive – +0.6%
vs. expectations for +0.5% and a Q4 reading of 0.6%. Personal consumption was a bit stronger than expected, at 1% vs. a
Bloomberg forecast of 0.7%. But that was still the
smallest rise [...]
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Sorry for the lack of posts today — been pretty busy. One thing that I couldn’t help comment on, however: Have you
noticed that mortgage rates have been ticking higher lately? And that this has had an impact on purchase
applications?
The Mortgage Bankers Association’s weekly purchase application index dropped 6.4% to 357.30 in the week of April [...]
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Punch up a crude oil futures quote, ladies and gentlemen, and that’s what you would have seen a few moments ago for the
price of a barrel of black gold. Even the “see no
inflation, hear no inflation” Federal Reserve crowd
can’t seem to ignore this market action any more. Bloomberg just ran with a story called “Fisher [...]
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Look, there’s no way to sugarcoat the import price figures that were released today. They stunk to high heaven. Some
details:
* Overall import prices surged 2.8% in March, well above the 2% rise that was expected. If you strip out
petroleum, you still get a very large 1.1% rise. Strip out all fuels? Prices were up 0.9%, the [...]
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