A recent report from the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia charges the Bureau of Labor Statistics with potentially overstating job growth in the second quarter. CNBC's Steve Liesman joins 'Squawk Box' to report.
It reminds me of the Biden FBI understating crime statistics.
So much corruption being exposed, yet one would have to be extremely partisan or a willing tools not to see it. I will say the American people have been played by both sides of the political aisle.
It reminds me of the Biden FBI understating crime statistics.
So much corruption being exposed, yet one would have to be extremely partisan or a willing tools not to see it. I will say the American people have been played by both sides of the political aisle.
narrator:
there is no corruption being exposed. By DOGE anyway.
The average monthly difference is 0.4%. Big number on its own, very, very small as a proportion of the total
“When spread through the prior year, the average monthly job gain from April 2023 through March 2024 was 173,500 versus nearly 242,000, an analysis of BLS data shows.”
So much corruption being exposed, yet one would have to be extremely partisan or a willing tools not to see it. I will say the American people have been played by both sides of the political aisle.
narrator:
there is no corruption being exposed. By DOGE anyway.
It's the same thing as the tariffs.
It's literally all just for show and for spite. None of it means anything or stands for anything, and you can fully expect it to completely evaporate by next month
The average monthly difference is 0.4%. Big number on its own, very, very small as a proportion of the total
“When spread through the prior year, the average monthly job gain from April 2023 through March 2024 was 173,500 versus nearly 242,000, an analysis of BLS data shows.”
I forgot the reason for the revisions but it has to do with reconciling data that come in at different times I think.
The fun part of the downward revisions is that they say great things about the US economy. The holy grail of an economy is increased productivity...and if our GDP is being produced by fewer workers that we thought....that means productivity is higher than we thought!
there is no corruption being exposed. By DOGE anyway.
It's the same thing as the tariffs.
It's literally all just for show and for spite. None of it means anything or stands for anything, and you can fully expect it to completely evaporate by next month
Year to date there seem to be more interesting developments...although only five weeks, so lots of noise. Anecdotally, there can be sentiment changes when the calendar year changes. And of course the inaugurations blitz is in that time and that chaos shoved things around.
Year to Date
ARKK +11
Gold +10
EU Defense +9
US Defense +8
Financials +7
Europe +7
AI stocks +6
Healthcare +6
Comms +6
Non US Developed +5
Materials +5
EM Debt +4
Value +4
Industrials +4
SP500 +3
Utilities +3
Small Caps +3 REITs +3
Energy +3 BTC +3
Equal weight SP500 +3
EM ex China +2
TIPS +2
EM +2
60/40 +2
ST TIPS +1
Cons Staples +1
ST Corps +1
ST Junk +1
Corp Bonds +1
Junk +1
Hussman +1
Inter Treas +1
Cons Disc +1
Tech 0 Retail -2 Weed -3
NVDA -3
MSFT -3
Peloton -4
Apple -9 TSLA -10%
That's more interesting, right?
Obvi Europe is the star. Who would have predicted that?
Solid 1% return for bonds. That should steady the stock market.
Odd divergences in tech...overall underperformance, and big underperformance by giants. But the comms sector was fine. AI was fine despite deepseek scare. Shows the problem when a few giants dominate indices.
Good to see ARKK having another run.
That gold price...there is clearly fear out there.
Igy has done well with EM debt if he held on. That's interesting, despite the strong dollar. Not supposed to happen like that.
So overall, only a month, but a shift to cheaper stocks. Value had a great month, some tech underperformed but the AI story kept going, bonds did well. Europe the star.
There's long been talk about what happens when the expensive US stocks hit a wall...will money flow to cheap europe? It seems to be happening.
This post was edited 47 seconds after it was posted.
“When spread through the prior year, the average monthly job gain from April 2023 through March 2024 was 173,500 versus nearly 242,000, an analysis of BLS data shows.”
I forgot the reason for the revisions but it has to do with reconciling data that come in at different times I think.
The fun part of the downward revisions is that they say great things about the US economy. The holy grail of an economy is increased productivity...and if our GDP is being produced by fewer workers that we thought....that means productivity is higher than we thought!
Two-thirds of all jobs added in Biden's last year were directly or indirectly funded by taxpayer dollars while manufacturing fell almost 100k - completely unsustainable: pic.twitter.com/QTkwhfaer9
I forgot the reason for the revisions but it has to do with reconciling data that come in at different times I think.
The fun part of the downward revisions is that they say great things about the US economy. The holy grail of an economy is increased productivity...and if our GDP is being produced by fewer workers that we thought....that means productivity is higher than we thought!
First off, manufacturing is not the key sector that means so much. Manufacturing employment is falling around the globe because of efficiency tech. In any case, there are more employees in mfgring now than pre-covid, which is good.
Third off, agreed that there has been a surge in government hiring. Obviously that is local and state also, which Biden had little to do with. It's a boom time. States and localities have a lot of money right now and they are spending it. I'm sure most of us would agree growth in government workers is not a great thing. But that's not where the spending problem is...the spending problem is in entitlements and defense. It's a big flashy show to point at workers as the problem, but they aren't it.
while fed employees have been rising...as a percent of total workers they have not. So that's good.
"While the number of federal workers has grown over time, their share of the civilian workforce has generally held steady in recent years. The federal government (again excluding the Postal Service) accounts for 1.5% of total civilian employment, a share that – except for a temporary bump in mid-2020 for the decennial census – has been largely constant for more than a decade."
One of my better running friends is a regional safety manager at the Bureau of Reclamation. A few years ago they hosted a office luncheon to encourage employees to show up to work. One habitual lazy slob, when she showed up to work lumbered in after 10:00 am.
White House Deputy Chief of Staff @StephenM: "If you refuse to come back to the office, you're going to be laid off. Why would federal taxpayers be subsidizing Netflix watching at home?" pic.twitter.com/9th0AfPp3k
I started shorting Tesla this week. If it had a normal PE then I would not. But this thing is priced like Nvidia not a car maker. Triple digit PE.
the below is fred hickey, who is a permabear so caveat emptor but come on. How does the stock withstand this?
The Tesla car sales (or lack thereof) situation is getting interesting. "Tesla's (TSLA) sales in China fell 11.5% on a year-over-year basis in the month of January, while Chinese competitor BYD sales surged an annualized 47%, according to data from the China Passenger Car Association released on Friday. The data also showed deliveries of Tesla's Model 3 and Model Y vehicles made in China fell 32.6% from December." That's with extended 0% financing plans and price cuts. Meanwhile, over in Europe, Tesla's January car sales in France plummeted 63% year-over-year, in Germany sales plunged 60% and in Norway they were down 38%. Tesla U.K. sales in January fell 8%. Haven't seen U.S. numbers for January yet, but electrek reported this week that Tesla's January sales in California, by far the biggest EV market in the U.S., "dropped by double digits" (percents). With approximately 80% of EV buyers in the U.S. being registered Democrats, the "Elon Effect" may be an issue. I''m guessing Tesla's Canadian sales in January haven't been so hot either. Tesla is one of the Mag 7 stocks and has a tremendous cult following, but if sales keep declining - now at an accelerated pace - and margins contract, the bro's willing to pay 185 times earnings might start to think otherwise. In a declining market liquidity environment in 2025, Optimus hype might no longer be enough to keep this Mag 7's stock's grossly bloated valuation aloft for much longer.
I have argued the Fed and Treasury had an unholy alliance requiring increasing convoluted machinations to keep the scheme going.
The Fed is still paying banks and other financial institutions $450 million DAILY to keep the broken monetary system together - let me know if you need your next target, @DOGE ! pic.twitter.com/0CqpiDphZt
I don't have much $$ in play and have always pretty much split it between stocks and bonds, but a few weeks back--before the inauguration, actually--I shifted some more of it into a bond fund. I know President Trump is generally considered good for stocks but some of what he and Musk were talking about just seemed like it was going to generate some inflation--maybe, and some uncertainty--definitely.
Though I have a finance degree, I'm not a sophisticated investor (as may be obvious), but possible inflation and definite uncertainty didn't seem like a great environment for stocks or for further lowering of the Fed's rates. So going more with bonds seemed to make sense. We'll see.
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