Consumer spending, which accounts for about 70% of U.S. economic activity, rose an annualized 0.8% in the April-to-June quarter, according to the third estimate of gross domestic product from the Bureau of Economic Analysis. The last estimate put the annualized growth rate at 1.7%.
Mortgage rates surged to a 23-year high this week. The rate on the average 30-year fixed mortgage increased to 7.31% from 7.19% the week prior, according to Freddie Mac. That’s the highest rate since mid-December 2000, when it averaged 7.42%.
The Standard & Poor’s 500 index (closing price) peaked on July 31 at 4588.96. The index is down 5.9% since then (as of the September 22 close.) That’s not correction territory (a drop of 10% ore more) but I’d say stocks can feel the hot breath of a correction on the back of their necks, The small-cap Russell 2000 Index has lost more than 11% from its July 31 closing high, roughly twice the decline in the S&P 500 Index over the same time. There are other signs of trouble in the stock market.
Yeah, you’ve read all the stories about who will get hurt by a government shutdown–folks who need passports, communities in need of disaster aid, childcare centers, air travelers–and I’m sure your full up to your eyeballs with stories about how the Republican majority in in House is so dysfunctional that Speaker Kevin McCarthy couldn’t win a vote to declare water wet. But I’ve got some really good news: because the statisticians who compile the data on GDP, employment trends, producer and consumer prices, and other indicators that track the economy will be furloughed if the government shuts down, we’re not likely to know the full extent of the damage until we’re well into what could be a prolonged shutdown. Of course, it’s not clear that not knowing will be appreciated by financial markets that are already looking a bit anxious.
In this Special Report I’m going to start by sorting out the data that the market’s moves will likely depend on for the rest of 2023. That’s today’s post, Part 1 of this Special Report. Then I’ll try to handicap the likelihood that the data will zig or zag. And give you a sense of how far away from the current consensus the actual result might fall. And then finally, I’ll give you 10 moves for the rest of 2023 that are the most likely, in my opinion, to result in profits and that won’t wind up costing you big if the data winds up throwing investors a curve.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSM), the company that makes the chips for everyone from Apple to Nvidia, has told suppliers to delay some deliveries amid concerns about slowing chip demand, according to a new report Friday from Reuters. The company has told large chip-equipment suppliers to delay some deliveries, Reuters reported. The company is “increasingly nervous” about demand from its customers, the report said.Last week, the company said its August revenue fell 13.5% from last year but rose 6.2% from the prior month. As you might imagine, the news wasn’t greeted with cheers by investors in technology stocks.
The People’s Bank of China cut the amount of cash banks must hold in reserve for the second time this year. The move is an effort to boost flagging economic growth in China. The bank could have cut its benchmark interest rate in pursuit of the same goal. But that would have led to more selling against the yuan and the People’s Bank has been busy in the trenches in recent weeks trying to prop up the yuan agains the dollar. The question, of course, is whether the cut in reserve requirements will be enough, without a reduction in interest rates, to revive growth in China’s economy.
The theory, for today at least, is that the uptick in CPI inflation for August doesn’t change the basis calculus at the Federal Reserve.
More American consumers fell behind on their car loan and credit card payments in the last quarter than at any time in more than a decade. The problem is most acute for lower-income consumers who have exhausted the money from government stimulus checks during the Pandemic and who are seeing breaks on rent and student debt expire. Higher interest rates from the Federal Reserve aren’t helping any. The average credit card interest rate is already at a record high 20.6%, according to Bankrate.com, and could well continue climbing if the Fed tightens further in its fight against inflation. Student loan payments that were paused for more than three years are poised to resume in October. And banks and other lenders have been clamping down on credit lines for months after the spring banking turmoil. There is, of course, the question of whether the Fed is “happy” with this trend.
As cities like Phoenix bake–the city has recorded a record 19 straight days of temperatures above 110 as of July 18–and as 58 million people in the United States are forced to face 3-digit temperatures this week, and as researchers in Europe estimate that the 2023 death toll from extreme heat is likely to surpass the 2022 record to 61,000 (up from 40,000 in 2018 and 2019), you’d think it’s impossible to underestimate the climate disaster now facing us. But it is. The stories about extreme heat (and the deaths from it) and about deaths in flash floods (because hotter air can carry a larger load of water) and in the first recorded tropical storm to hit Los Angeles and about the likelihood that polar bears face extinction focus on what I’d call primary effects of global climate change. But the secondary and tertiary effects of climate change look to be even bigger, more far-reaching, and to have a bigger impact on the daily lives of billions of human beings.The terrifying truth is that our civilization is a lot more vulnerable than we realize because of these secondary effects. The crisis in the Florida citrus industry is a good, if very depressing, example of the power of these secondary (and beyond) effects.
The Treasury will auction a literal truckload of debt this week. And that’s making the bond market nervous. We’ve already had major volatility that wiped out this year’s 4% gain in Treasury bonds. The worry is focused on the long end of the yield curve where demand for 20- and 30-year Treasuries has been light. The Bloomberg index of Treasuries maturing in 10 years and more has slumped 5.7% so far in August.
Credit card balances hit $1.03 trillion in the second quarter, up 4.6% from $986 billion in the preceding quarter, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
