Down goes the Dow

"Cop out" is a slang term for avoiding or failing to fulfill a responsibility, commitment, or difficulty

Meanwhile on the economic front. Is an aging population really a bad thing for the economy?

But that doesn’t mean that the American economy, or even the welfare system, are doomed by an aging population. In fact, though overall economic growth is threatened by population aging, the opposite is true for per capita wages, consumption and productivity, which may actually rise in such a scenario. That’s because an aging population means more capital per available worker, assuming that savings rates stay the same.

fivethirtyeight.com

Why An Aging Population Might Not Doom The American Economy

Santul Nerkar

The American economy is booming and robust. Just look at the chart below, which shows that the overall unemployment rate — the share of people within the labor …

Link:fivethirtyeight.com/features/why-an-ag...

Fascinating article and thanks for that.

It seems to suggest that policy decisions may be instrumental in addressing this huge shift in demographics, and frames the backdrop in which these will become necessary.

As for me, just let me retire already. I understand there's a labor shortage. But I also understand why those French demonstrators are so vehement in wanting to maintain the date they have been promised and planned to retire at.

Today's prediction review is a pretty accurate one. Back in mid Oct 2022, with the markets hitting new lows and inflation up to 8%, this analyst (with a high 382,000 followers) said eh you know what inflation is probably peaking, and the stock market's young bounce off the bottom shows it agrees with me. In other words, she suggested the inflation would start falling and she was right, down to 5.0% today from that 8%.

Genevieve Roch-Decter, CFA
@GRDecter
Inflation just hit a 40-year high, and everyone is panicking. Markets were expecting inflation to be transitory, and the CPI print seemed to kill that notion. The S&P500 fell 50 points on open.
But we think that yesterday’s CPI print was misleading.
Time for a 🧵
11:28 AM · Oct 14, 2022

What would you do with yourself if you retired, Seattle?

Oh, don't ask. Seriously, don't ask, and if you have to, especially don't ask on a Monday morning....

Two things- my running and conditioning has taken on a new purpose since a bad injury and I've doubled up on daily workouts trying to get back to pre-injury self. And I have a woodshop just calling to me, all set up, with projects on the bench, and I can't wait to get back into making sawdust again.

That and a FT job are a bit more than I can make progress on each day.

Counting down the days at this point and thanks for asking.

EDIT: the reason i say to not ask is that I am up to my eyeballs with work stuff, with it being Monday morning, and the last thing I need to think about now is everything I could be doing if retired already. So, just joking with ya.

Are you kidding me - Nas. going positive into the close after being down all day?

Same with Apple.

Signs like that tend to suggest to me at least that there is support at these levels and there's more interest in buying a dip that there is in finding a good price to bail.

Today's prediction check:

Hard to believe it, but just a month ago the country was having a financial crisis. Now look at us go! What an economy. Supertanker America. Point it in a direction and it's very hard to knock it off course.

Right near the peak of the fear, this analysts looked at the saving of First Republican and said 'well, crisis over.'

Good call. Financial stocks up 4% from then. Although regional bank stocks have not recovered - seems that they are losing share to the giants.

I award this as a good call. Easy to be scared but this guy looked around the corner and got it right. So far, anyway.

Bloomberg
@business
The “banking crisis is over,” Odeon Capital analyst Dick Bove says after reports that the nation’s largest private banks will rescue First Republic

March 16, 2023

heh I hear you. I don't know what you do for a living. Don't dox yourself but I'm curious.

Good that you have things waiting for you in retirement.

I would do more with cars...learn how to take care of them, race karts, maybe buy a vintage sports car.

But my job isn't very demanding so I have time to do most things I would do if retired. And I'd lose a sense of being needed. Not sure retirement would be good for me.

This is very common and a lot of people find the transition to retirement very difficult. In my own circles, I’d guess that better than 9 in 10 acquaintances who retired only semi-retired or else unretired pretty quickly because the transition is too hard. Me and my spouse are hoping to stay fully retired, and have at least committed to a year or more completely retired before considering some form of work. Wish us luck… 🙂

Good luck!

I saw plenty of guys at my work who stayed well past their retirement date due to fear of the unknown or fear of the loss of security/structure that comes with having a job. None of these guys loved their job, they were just scared to walk away from it. Some people just don't do well without a job to give them a sense of purpose.

Daily Prediction Check:

This bigtime poster (198,000 followers) thought the banking crisis would get worse, not better.

The prediction was made a month ago, 3/19/23

His thesis was correct: money would leave deposit accounts because it could get better returns in money market funds. That happened. The poster thought that would be a crisis for banks. But so far it has not been a major crisis. More a slow drain. Could get worse, sure.

Interesting instance of getting an economic trend correct...but getting its market effect wrong. Which is what happens a lot to investors: For example they read 'profit slowdown' and sell shares. But then even as earnings fall, shares don't. For example.

AndreasStenoLarsen
@AndreasSteno
Here is why I think the banking crisis is going to accelerate in coming weeks!
The underlying issue is of monetary nature, why cuts are needed ASAP to solve it. The Fed is not likely to listen for now.
1/n
7:46 AM · Mar 19, 2023
·
486.3K
Views

I heard about this yesterday on Marketplace (great show, btw), and I wonder if anyone has any thoughts on it. Sounds like a great rate, and by all appearances, i will be digging a bit deeper into this tonight.

In full disclosure, I do own Apple stock, though that is not why I am asking about this.

And on another note, just seeing the headlines but Tesla earnings after the bell not looking so good.

apple.com

Apple Card’s new high-yield Savings account is now available, offering a 4.15 percent APY

With no fees, no minimum deposits, and no minimum balance requirements, users can easily set up and manage their Savings account directly from Wallet.

Link:www.apple.com/newsroom/2023/04/apple-c...

Yeah TSLA is dragging down the market today. Fascinating how that company is dropping its prices, trying to become a mass-maker of cars at lower price points, rather than a luxe product. Would be a giant triumph if it can get that done. As I understand it, I think they're trying to make EV credits apply only to US cars, which would help.

Today's prediction is another from the banking crisis last month.

This one is out of my wheelhouse so I'm not sure I am interpreting it correctly.

This poster noted that the credit default swaps of office REIT Vornado had blown out, suggesting the company's ability to service its debt was in question.

Since then the stock has risen 25%, implying that no, the company's ability to service its debt is not a serious question. Another example of having a fact correct but the stock market not caring about it. If you had shorted VNO based on this, you got your head ripped off. The CDS blowout was, so far, not indicative of a major problem, and showed people panicking unwisely.

That said, chances are 1/3 that I am misinterpreting this. I suspect Gente could clear it up if I have something wrong.

Steve Hou (“CONSUME LESS!”)
@stevehouf
Speaking of Commercial Real Estate, here's $VNO's CDS blowing out.

The SpaceX Rocket launched this morning exploded a few minutes after take off. Musk founded SpaceX in 2002. No crew on board, luckily.

Today's prediction is one of a school of market analysis that finds patterns. This one is a classic: The NASD followed a similar pattern earlier, which resulted in a subsequent large fall. So, the idea is, since humans think the same way, the current pattern might also result in a big drop.

In other words, using past charts to predict the future.

Didn't' work this time. The poster found a repeating pattern that resulted in a sharp NASD drop in the past. But we now know that the NASD rose 2% in a month or so, from when he pointed out this repeating pattern. Pretty chart though.

We've been hearing of a recession, possibly a very large one, for about the past two years. While there has been slowdown and some layoffs, particularly in tech, we've yet to see anything major or even any further drop in the markets... I'm actually pretty surprised and am starting to think things won't get significantly worse from here, that we very well be more or less on a slow climb upward, and the S&P500 will be back to 4800 by this time next year.