Daily Research Updates
Morning Briefings
Expert market analysis delivered every morning. Stay informed with comprehensive research and data-driven insights.
Lots of Good News About Jobs
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Our proxy for wages and salaries at another record high. (2) The inflation tax is taking its toll. (3) Are teachers quitting, retiring, or both? (4) Pandemic-challenged industries continue to recover. (5) More full-time jobs for part-time workers. (6) Wages rising faster for lower-wage workers, and beating inflation. (7) Biggest wage gains in industries with highest job openings rates. (8) A close look at NILFs. (9) Retiring seniors. (10) The grim reaper is taking a toll on labor force too. (11) Foreign workers have gone back home. (12) Movie review: “No Time To Die” (-).
Facebook, Russian Gas & Green Shell
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Facebook took some hits. (2) Facebook's AI needs to catch up to the bad guys. (3) Understanding the influence of algorithms. (4) Zuckerberg defends his baby. (5) Energy prices take a breather. (6) Putin tells Europe not to worry—he's got plenty of natural gas. (7) Shell is turning green. (8) Shell is spending on wind, solar, biofuels, and CO2 disposal.
That ’70s Show?
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Panic Attack #70 comes with more baggage than usual. (2) Global energy crisis beats Evergrande for number #1 on worry list. (3) Lots of different reasons for energy troubles in Europe and China. (4) US oil and gas rig count remains low. (5) Weekly US oil output isn’t responding to higher oil prices. (6) Parts shortages slamming the brakes on auto sales. (7) More bad news from China: property developers in trouble and more tensions with Taiwan. (8) Tale of two scenarios. (9) Q3 fundamentals likely to be strong, while guidance will be unsettling.
People’s Bank of Amerika (FKA ‘the Fed’)
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) A more populist Fed in 2022 with a new Fed chair. (2) Powell conversion to progressivism is too recent. (3) Yellen’s friends. (4) More FOMC seats opening up. (5) Fed may raise inflation target next year. (6) Day trading at the Fed. (7) Pay no attention to the dot plot behind the curtain. (8) Meet Lael Brainard. (9) The Fed is way behind the curve. (10) Meet Saule Omarova. (11) Amerika, the 1987 miniseries.
A Spell of Stagflation
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Consumers are experiencing stagflation currently. (2) Price increases offsetting most of the rise in personal income this year. (3) Real consumption of goods falling over past five months. (4) Delta and inflation surge depressing Consumer Optimism Index. (5) Costco is rationing some products. (6) Inventory restocking and capital spending should offset weak consumer spending. (7) Here is how government policies have been causing global supply-chain chaos and boosting inflation. (8) Climate change activists are depressing fossil fuel supplies faster than boosting renewable sources of energy, which are unreliable. (9) Powell is frustrated by inflationary supply bottlenecks that he helped cause. (10) Why raising taxes on corporations and pass-throughs is bad for jobs growth. (11) Movie review: “The Many Saints of Newark” (- -).
September, Energy, & Crypto
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Glad September is almost over. (2) Higher interest rates help S&P 500 Financials, and higher oil prices boost S&P 500 Energy. (3) Rising commodity and transport prices hit earnings. (4) Vietnam’s factory closures hurting US retailers. (5) Rising energy prices around the world raise questions about green energy. (6) The price of Europe’s carbon credits doubles this year. (7) China’s factories facing blackouts. (8) Everyone wants LNG, and the US is selling it. (9) Cryptocurrencies face criticism from Dimon and Gensler. (10) China ends debate and bans cryptocurrency transactions and mining. (11) Meet Mr. Goxx, a crypto-investing hamster.
Is Powell Transitory?
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Bonds are starting to make sense again. (2) Tapering is coming. (3) New tune on tapering in latest FOMC statement. (4) Powell says employment goal “all but met.” (5) Brainard agrees. (6) Copper/gold price ratio remains bearish for bonds. (7) Powell: Forget base effect and focus on supply bottlenecks. (8) Bullish and diversified for frequent rotations. (9) Financials and Energy get a turn to outperform. (10) DC’s sausage factory. (11) Powell, the Pivoter. (12) Is he as dangerous as Senator Warren says?
Some Good News, Some Bad News
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Cresting pandemic wave. (2) Back to pre-pandemic railcar loadings. (3) Ford is parking lots of unfinished trucks at Kentucky Speedway. (4) Record new orders with usual lag in shipments. (5) Q3 real GDP tracking at 3.2%. (6) Europe is providing a cautionary tale on outlook for energy availability and pricing. (7) Chevron’s CEO implies climate activists interfering with market signals. (8) President Xi facing two crises.
What Are the Odds?
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) On the road in Cincinnati. (2) Lots to talk about. (3) The Roaring ’20s vs the Great Inflation of the ’70s. (4) Still placing 65/35 subjective odds. (5) Productivity growth is the key swing variable. (6) Manufacturing productivity growth decline coincided with US manufacturing capacity moving to China. (7) The case for reshoring has never been better. (8) A productivity boom would be good for real wages and profit margins. (9) Productivity growth collapsed during the 1970s. (10) Three inflation scenarios. (11) Climate change activists could leave us all out in the cold. (12) Movie review: “Nine Perfect Strangers” (+).
Natural Gas & Unnatural Exosuits
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Evergrande’s demise continues to unfold. (2) Watching for the ripple effects on the Chinese economy. (3) US companies may get caught in the morass. (4) Natural gas supplies becoming the world’s latest problem. (5) Less wind and low natural gas production leads to spiking prices. (6) Europe’s dependence on US/Russia natural gas imports grows. (7) Demand for LNG strong in Asia and Brazil too. (8) High gas prices have UK energy retailers going bust and fertilizer factories closing. (9) Sensitive robots with soft, smart attachments can pick up fruit and Peeps.
Animal Farm
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Gray rhinos, black swans, and blue angels. (2) Evergrande’s troubles started about a year ago with its first liquidity scare. (3) “Three red lines” regulation worsened liquidity crunch for property developers in recent months. (4) More cracks in the Great Wall of China. (5) Will this be the Great Fall of China? (6) Xi Jinping, Mao Zedong, and George Orwell. (7) Xi’s hard left turn. (8) Nine gray rhinos. (9) S&P 500 forward revenues, earnings, and profit margin all at record highs.
Too Grande To Fail?
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) China’s Evergrande panic attack hits global stock markets. (2) Crash course in Evergrande. (3) “Massive” describes its scale, debt, and crisis. (4) Will it’s rescue also be massive? (5) Lehman or LTCM? (6) China should be building more nursing homes than apartment buildings. (7) Betting against a credit crunch. (8) Bullish for the dollar, bearish for commodity prices.
What’s the Matter?
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Panic Attack #70? (2) S&P 500 won’t double again anytime soon. (3) A very long stretch above 200-dma. (4) Narrowing breadth. (5) Dow Theory raising a caution flag in theory. (6) September and October are two bad months that often provide good buying opportunities. (7) Bull-Bear Ratio getting more bearish, which is bullish. (8) Nine items on the worry list. (9) Evergrande is #1 right now. Will it be Lehman or LTCM? (10) McConnell won’t play Dems’ game. (11) Missing parts. (12) Biden’s taxes on small businesses. (13) China and Russia playing war games.
Travel, Evergrande & Hydrogen
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Travel stocks looking better if US Delta cases have peaked. (2) Waiting for the return of the US business traveler. (3) Watching Covid case counts in China and new gambling rules in Macau. (4) Covid took a bite out of China’s August air travel and KFC sales. (5) Analysts’ net earnings revisions turn positive for S&P 500 travel-related industries. (6) Why we’re watching China’s very leveraged, very troubled, very large property developer Evergrande. (7) Angry Chinese consumers at Evergrande’s doorstep demand their money back. (8) Trucks and cars powered by hydrogen fuel cells give EVs a run for their money.
Inflation & Labor
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Powell scores a point. (2) Three moderating factors. (3) The spectrum of inflation forecasts. (4) Roaring 2020s vs Inflationary 1970s. (5) Inflation expectations remain elevated according to FRB-NY survey. (6) Small business owners raising prices. (7) Diminishing base effect. (8) Rent inflation on the rise. (9) Lots of job openings. (10) A woeful tale from businesses in Richmond area looking for workers.
Global Tapering Ahead?
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Central bankers are the new Wild Bunch. (2) Since start of pandemic, major central bank assets up 51%. (3) Major central bank assets growing at slower pace. (4) Add that to the stock market’s worries list. (5) Is ECB tapering or recalibrating? (6) ECB’s LTRO facility is a big hit. (7) ECB is also struggling with whether inflation is transitory or persistent. (8) BOJ preparing to end Kuroda’s excellent adventure. (9) PBOC likely to cut required reserves ratio. (10) Fed setting the stage for tapering before year-end.
Not So Transitory After All?
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Raising S&P 500 EPS by $5 per year through 2023. (2) Five quarterly earnings hooks in a row. (3) Forward earnings at another record high. (4) A long worry list is traditional this time of year. (5) No sign of a peak in August’s PPI. (6) Three broad measures of consumer prices aren’t pretty. (7) Almost $1.5 trillion in reverse repos at the Fed. (8) Bonds are awash in liquidity. (9) Fund flows contradict TINA. (10) Drilling down into the PPI rabbit hole.
Transportation, Supply Chains & Carbon Trading
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Some retailers’ shelves are looking a little sparse. (2) Watching the inventory-to-sales ratio slide. (3) Inventory stuck on trains, railroads, and boats. (4) More container ships are bobbing in the waters off the coast of Los Angeles than are at port. (5) Empty shipping containers are in the wrong locations. (6) Truck drivers still in short supply. (7) Prices throughout the shipping complex have surged. (8) Lots of optimism priced into railroad and trucking stocks. (9) The market for carbon credits may grow into a big business. (10) Traders, project developers, and verifiers all starting businesses.
Around the World
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Spreading Covid for the holidays. (2) Comparative pandemic waves around the world. (3) Israel leads the way. (4) US fiscal and monetary easing leaked abroad through US trade deficit. (5) Are commodity prices peaking? (6) Global PMIs showing global slowdown. (7) Chip shortage is tapping on global auto industry’s brakes. (8) US leading the global performance derby for forward revenues, forward earnings, and forward profit margins. (9) Comparing Go Global P/E to US Value P/E. (10) Stay Home still beating Go Global.
Let’s Get Real
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Slower GDP growth ahead. (2) Pent-up demand for goods has been satisfied. (3) Inflation is eroding purchasing power. (4) Real consumer spending flat for the past four months. (5) Auto industry’s lament: “Buddy, can you spare some chips?” (6) Priced out of the housing market. (7) Capital spending booming. (8) Plenty of room for restocking. (9) Covid still messing up the labor market. (10) Wages inflating. (11) Doves vs hawks on the FOMC. (12) Movie review: “A Private War” (+ + +).
Financials, China & Carbon
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Financials take the lead ytd in 2021’s homestretch. (2) Reversal of loan-loss reserves offsets low interest rates and slack loan growth. (3) Could Financials be signaling higher interest rates ahead? (4) China’s Xi continues to meddle. (5) This time, gamers, online algorithm users, and famous actors face new rules. (6) Chinese services economy, hurt by Covid resurgence, contracts in August. (7) Watching Chinese property giant’s $88 billion of distressed debt. (8) Examining ways to recycle captured carbon. (9) The CO2 for Coca-Cola's bottled water comes out of thin air.
Modern Monetary Theory In Practice
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Forward earnings continue to lead S&P 500 to record highs. (2) Another crisis, another opportunity for politicians. (3) MMT on steroids and speed. (4) A guide to sausage making in DC. (5) Will moderate Democrats avert a progressive onslaught? (6) Powell’s inflation dashboard missing some dials. (7) Different measures of inflationary expectations show different readings. (8) Powell admits progress has been made, but continues to accentuate the negatives in the jobs market.
Corporate Finance For Fun & Profit
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Revenues and earnings continue to impress. (2) Both S&P and NIPA profit margins at record highs. (3) S&P 500 accounts for about 60% of NIPA profits. (4) Lots of S corporations in the mix. (5) Are companies offsetting rising costs with productivity, raising prices, or both? (6) Regional business surveys showing another increase in prices-received index as prices-paid index levels at record high. (7) Wage inflation not widespread yet. (8) The big risk is a wage-price spiral if productivity disappoints. (9) Corporate cash flow at record-high $3 trillion. (10) Corporations floating lots of new issues in Fed’s overflowing punchbowl.
Some Thoughts on Valuation
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) Tapering before the end of the year. (2) Rate hikes not for a while. (3) Commercial banks facing big deposit inflows and weak loan demand buying bonds. (4) S&P 500 tracking Dividend Yield Model. (5) Are SMidCaps cheap or not? (6) Closer looks at S&P 500 vs Russell 1000 and S&P 600 vs Russell 2000. (7) Powell declares mission accomplished on inflation front. (8) July’s PCED inflation data still not confirming inflation is transitory. (9) Four regional business surveys showing possible peaks in prices-paid indexes, while prices-received indexes hit new highs in August. (10) Movie review: “Respect” (+ +).
The Beats Go On
Check out the accompanying pdf and chart collection. (1) The opera ain’t over. (2) Q2 revenues and earnings growth beats will be hard to top for a while. (3) Another record high for profit margin. (4) Lots of upbeat surprises. (5) FOMC discussed tapering at July meeting. (6) November meeting likely to start tapering process. (7) Powell’s virtual lullaby. (8) Powell’s dashboard showing progress in the labor market with room for a bit more progress.