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Check back at 8:20 AM Central for the latest Housing data. A look at the calendar is all it takes to figure out what will (likely) happen today and through the balance of the week in markets: The Dow and other indices should post small rises today as this is the end of Q3 and we usually expect to see window-dressing, which in this case may be holding us up. After about mid-day today, after the bonuses are safe for the fund managers I wouldn’t be surprised to see the market decline resume in earnest along about tomorrow, or maybe Thursday.
(Albuquerque, NM) The bad news yesterday was that the bond yield was down, and that drove the US dollar purchasing power UP. That, in turn, meant that it didn’t take as many dollars to buy the same thing as it did before. Or, more practically, if you’d bought the day before, then the number of dollars you’d get for sale of the asset yesterday would have been down., This morning, we see the price of gold is up, which means the dollar is down, which means that the number of dollars needed will move up a bit (or at least should) which should turn the market as the day wears on, although some follow-through selling is expected at the open. If you’re looking for a tool to guide your investments as the gigantic tug of war continues between inflation and deflation, you might consider looking at the Bitcoin prices over here After setting a high near $1,200 back in December of 2013, the price of Bitcoins dropped to almost $350 in mid-April of last year.
(Gig Harbor, WA) OK, enough of the serious stuff. We need a break… When one of the biggest news stories of the week is that Apple has reinvented the watch so that it can put further in debt – and this is hailed as progress – it’s time we put our feet down and get back to food-binging because that’s one of the few pastimes that actually makes sense, anymore. Our “binge” will happen Sunday morning. And the weapon of choice will be French Toast. In the rush to do this & that, I haven’t gotten around to describing chef-daughter Allison’s incredible French toast.
(Gig Harbor, WA) It was a marvelous weekend up here in the Pacific Northwest. Not a care in the world since the sun was out, all the relatives were in marvelous form, and daughter Allison (the award-winning chef) whipped up apple sauce/cream cheese French toast Saturday that was incredible. Dinner at the golf club with the other side of the family was great, too, especially the blow-torched prime rib. Toss in a sci-fi movie festival and laundry for a lazy Sunday and it is such a drag looking at numbers again, I can’t stand it. But look we must and right out of the box the main thing to consider is that deflation is still running full steam.
While we await tomorrow’s federal employment numbers (look for the rate to maybe drop a 10th), we have some early job number previews out this morning: ROSELAND, N.J. – September 4, 2014 – Private sector employment increased by 204,000 jobs from July to August according to the August ADP National Employment Report®. Broadly distributed to the public each month, free of charge, the ADP National Employment Report is produced by ADP®, a leading global provider of Human Capital Management (HCM) solutions, in collaboration with Moody’s Analytics.
Both the S&P and the NASDAQ hit new records Thursday and while not rich, my long-term out of the money call options on the S&P look less stupid this morning than they did two weeks ago. Before we get into the Janet Yellen FedSpeak this morning in Jackson Ho Wyoming, where the Fedsters run to confab in the summer when it’s miserably hot in most of the rest of the country (48F and rain there this morning), I thought we would push back with a cuppa and do some serious thinking. Biggest problem in the world today? Lack of jobs. Biggest cause of lack of jobs?
Our overnight data run with www.nostrcodeus.com web-sweeping software about puked on the word autopilot which was not how I planned to start this morning’s column. And what it brings into focus is how mass media is massively manic. Here’s the deal:
It’s the little things that remind me of how we got to be a confused, bewildered, and mostly paralyzed by cognitive dissonance in this country. Come to think of it, without a southern border we may not even be a country any more. Maybe that’s like computer software with a memory leak…without borders were just…leak , leak, leak ourselves to death… A major dissonance arrived in Wednesday’s mail. There it was: A nice direct-mail piece suggesting that I subscribe to Alaska Magazine.
A person only pretends to be a prepper if they don’t have a basic ham radio and some kind of scanner capability, as I see it. A fair number of people (OK, one…) mentioned how useful last week’s notes on emergency services scanning was. And, since he was kind enough to send it a good write up, reader Bill’s ‘Part 2’ on how fire department lingo has changed over the years in useful stuff to have… “I am yet again honored. Thank you.Your advice to listen and get the feel of the way the channel sounds is good.
But only if you’re willing to look with fresh eyes. Last week I was busy pointing out to you how there were (mysteriously) 73,000 fewer people employed in the USA in the latest Labor Department jobs report, but somehow 288,000 new jobs had been created. In the process, 806-thousand just raptured out of the stats and so forth. By now, I’m sure you’re sick of me telling you there’s something rotten in Denmark, and being half of Danish background…hold it. Let’s not go there.
Well, it depends on which chart you want to look at, I suppose, as the Case Shiller/S&P/Dow Jones monthly housing report is out. Based on a consistent 20-city sample, I take this one as the “gold standard” of real estate price reports: New York, April 29, 2014 – Data through February 2014, released today by S&P Dow Jones Indices for its S&P/Case-Shiller1 Home Price Indices, the leading measure of U.S. home prices, show that the annual rates of gain slowed for the 10-City and 20-City Composites.
I had occasion to head up to Tyler, Texas Monday to meet up with visiting Howard Hill and lead him back to what we jokingly call Deliverance Country here in the outback. And while I was there I loaded up the car with supplies because we don’t like to shop and it’s 15-miles just to find a gas station around here… What struck me was how busy the town was. There were wall-to-wall people everywhere I looked. Parking lots of shopping areas were full, or darned near. The Barnes and Noble was busy, Northern Tool had a steady flow of people going through.