Mid Term
New claims for unemployment rise by 1.54 million for week ended June 6
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits continued to trend lower with 1.54 million workers applying in the week ended June 6. That's down from 1.9 million initial claims in the prior week. (Economists surveyed by Bloomberg had projected 1.55 million initial...
OECD projects global economy to shrink by 6% this year, worse than World Bank’s 5.2% forecast on Monday
The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the developed world's economic think tank, today forecast that the global economy would shrink by 6% this year. (OECD members accounted for 62% of global GDP in 2017.) That conclusion is based on a scenario in...
Looking ahead to a very disappointing and very messy second quarter earnings season
It's not too early to look ahead--with some trepidation--to the second quarter earnings season that begins with the report from JP Morgan Chase (JPM) about a month from now on July 14. "Trepidation" because Wall Street analysts have been cutting their earnings...
It’s official: We’re in a recession
The National Bureau of Economic Research has declared that the United States is officially in a recession. The committee said that U.S. economic growth peaked in February and then entered its first downturn since the 2007-2009 recession. This recession ends the...
Why today’s good news shock on jobs comes at a really unfortunate time
I'd argue the last thing we needed today was good news. In case you're been hiding under a rock, you know that the economy unexpectedly added 2.5 million jobs in May and the unemployment rate fell to 13.3%. (Read my immediately prior post for a run down of why these...
Keeping the coronavirus vaccine land rush in perspective
Some context to help you keep the next (that is after Moderna (MRNA)) coronavirus vaccine "sky's the limit" story in context By the count of the BioInvest Medical Technology Stock letter there are now 1,833 global coronavirus-related studies posted on...
Equal time for pessimists: S&P predicts huge rise in junk bond defaults
In a May 29 report Standard & Poor's has said it expects the trailing 12-month default rate for U.S. speculative-grade (that is "junk" debt rated below investment grade) corporate debt to rise to 12.5% by March 2021. The 12-month trailing default rate was 3.5% in...
Trick or Trend: Warning signs for the economy in Friday’s consumer spending report
Our regular (or occasional or perhaps occasionally regular) Friday series (actually running on Saturday this week) Trick or Trend looks at what might (or might not) be emerging investible trends. Exclusively on JAM. This post won't run anywhere else. Ever. In April...
Now it’s the Fed’s Powell’s turn to push stocks lower, urge Congress to provide more coronavirus money
Yesterday, I argued that the barrage of cautionary comments from Federal Reserve officials seemed designed to talk stock prices lower and to push Congress toward a new bigger coronavirus rescue package. (Why might the Fed want to slow the current rally? The only...
Trick or trend: Benchmark dates for the economy and the pandemic for the next month or two
Our regular (or occasional or perhaps occasionally regular) Friday series (actually running on Saturday this week) Trick or Trend looks at what might (or might not) be emerging investible trends. Exclusively on JAM. This post won't run anywhere else. Ever. Right now...
Fed keeps policy stable, says 0% rates as far as the eye can see
As expected the Federal Reserve left interest rates at their current level of 0%-0.25%. And there were very few changes in the central bank's language. But a few subtle shifts are worth noting, I believe. The Fed said in early April that “We have also committed to...Jim’s Stock Alerts
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