News

Want to begin with a “hard number”?  Sure, we can do that: The Producer Price Index for final demand was unchanged in February, seasonally adjusted, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Final demand prices rose 0.6 percent in January and 0.5 percent in December 2024. (See table A.) On an unadjusted basis, the … Read More

If the coming War with China and locked in to Target Zone life isn’t enough, how about a Second Depression, then? Today we have articles on all three prospects.  No, not reading for the faint of heart. We provide a very long report today comprised of three major topics. First, a repeat of a Comments … Read More

Can someone hand the President a doobie?  Chill a minute.  Look at some history, bro! Yes – due for a bounce.  But look at this trend package: Fortunately, this is a “day off” and already I have a tractor repair under my belt for the day. More on Peoplenomics.com tomorrow. But can someone mention the “Ship … Read More

I slept in till 6:30 AM today. A lovely change of pace.  Comments overnight reflected the “national gut wrenching” going on.  Ostensibly the fault of the Waffler in Chief. The thinking seems to be that America’s present rerun of 1929 is somehow driven by the decisional flip-flops of DJT.  But more rested reflection offers a … Read More

But we watch with interest: Stock market circuit breakers are mechanisms designed to temporarily halt trading on U.S. exchanges during significant market declines, aiming to prevent panic-selling and maintain orderly market operations. These circuit breakers are triggered based on the S&P 500 Index’s performance relative to the previous day’s closing value and are categorized into … Read More

Every picture tells, a story, don’t it? A little Rod Stewart with that sandwich?  Some dynamic hedging further down, then? More on Peoplenomics Wednesday. -g  

Markets are going through what we’d call in electronics, a kind of Class-B moment. In electronics, Class-B amplifiers are often called “push-pull” configurations: “In a push-pull Class B circuit, two complementary transistors (NPN and PNP in bipolar junction transistors or N-channel and P-channel in MOSFETs) are used, each conducting for only half of the input … Read More

A couple of notes on inflation to begin the day.  I have been cleaning up the office and the shop, so there were three old tube caddies – of the sort the TV repairman used to lug around. they had tubes in them, but nothing of any value there.  I spent a couple of hours … Read More

With Ukraine talks next week, the odds of a short but powerful bounce to recent market declines looms.  But as we shall point out, there are a few clouds and prophecies to temper the tone, a bit. Then there’s the matter of the Calendar and an interesting case of woo-woo overnight, As I have explained … Read More

We ought to begin with the federal jobs report, first thing.  We expected that the market would bounce around a bit in here, but honestly it has been quite the week so far.  In fact, at the close Thursday, the volatility index (VIX) was at 24.65 which is a far cry from the 15’s where it … Read More

There are about four – kinda separate – stories that have us paying attention today. Let’s start with the Challenger Job Cuts report just out: “U.S.-based employers announced 172,017 job cuts in February, the highest total for the month since 2009 when 186,350 job cuts were recorded. It is the highest monthly total since July … Read More

Although sometimes labeled a “perma-bear” there are times when  we actually do like the long side of things.  Not so much because of the State of the Union (yawns). But because of technical indicators which we will go over in today’s ChartPack. Then there’s the non-trivial matter of Downsizing – my latest book which I … Read More

I suppose we should begin with the Falling Markets part. Because we have been tracking America’s lurch toward a Second ’29 for a couple of decades.  A current (through early Futures today) looks (how to say this?) less than stellar… Going into tonight’s State of the Onion, let’s see how the Replay of 1929 is evolving: … Read More