We continue to believe the pandemic caused a secular shift toward work-from-home. The old models of how the labor force reacts to pay and working conditions have changed. This will lead to more "persistent" inflation.... Read More
Jim Bianco joins Bloomberg to discuss the Federal Reserve, Labor Market and the Delta Variant Ben Breitholtz: As foretold, the gap between US and German 10-year inflation breakevens is closing with recent range lows giving way. Investors pricing in a... Read More
To get a clearer picture of the slowdown in mobility, a deep dive into the data is necessary. Distinguishing between seasonal factors, Hurricane Ida, and the delta variant is a difficult task.... Read More
After the SEC suggested SPAC warrants should be considered liabilities instead of equity, SPAC activity came to a screeching halt.... Read More
Jim Bianco: Citi has monthly inflation surprise indices. Since today is the first they updated the August data. The data only goes back to 2009. This chart shows how “flat-footed” the economic community was when it comes to predicting inflation. ... Read More
Jim Bianco: ADP was a huge miss. The estimate was 625k (median) with a range of 400k to 850k, 34 economists offered guesses. The actual result was 374k, below the lowest guess. Warning! ADP has not been a good indicator of... Read More
Jim Bianco: US Latest But note that the cases from the south, including FL and TX, peaked on August 16 (orange line) But in the other 44 states, CV made a new high, and the rolling 7-day average (orange) continues... Read More
Ben Breitholtz: The ‘EVERYTHING RALLY’ is now the longest on record! The average Sharpe ratio across the spectrum of assets has been above 1-to-1 for 270 straight trading days. Such tightly packed risk-adjusted returns have only occurred ahead of the... Read More
Jim Bianco: *BIDEN ADVISERS EYE POWELL AS FED CHAIR, BRAINARD AS VICE CHAIR *BIDEN SEEN MAKING FED PERSONNEL ANNOUNCEMENTS LATER IN FALL *PAIRING POWELL AND BRAINARD COULD APPEASE LIBERAL DEMOCRATS Bloomberg: Biden Advisers Weigh Powell as Fed Chair, Brainard as... Read More
Ben Breitholtz joins Oliver Renick to discuss the seasonality of inflation and how it affects the different areas of the market, and he shares one key metric that will ultimately decide how high inflation goes. Financial Times: Jay Powell must... Read More
Jim Bianco joins Bloomberg’s “The Open” on 8/25/21 Alex Malitas: https://www.economist.com/finance-and-economics/2021/08/22/the-new-powell-doctrine?utm_campaign=editorial-social&utm_medium=social-organic&utm_source=twitter Ben Breitholtz: Isn’t this the same debate we’ve seen since 2009?! This is one way to do it! *DELTA AIR LINES TO IMPOSE $200/MO FEE ON UNVACCINATED EMPLOYEES We... Read More
With the delta variant surging across the country, we are beginning to see mobility data, specifically transit and the return to the office, showing signs of declining. Retail has not been hit as hard.... Read More
Alex Malitas: Ben have you done anything that separates elements that have peaked versus those that haven’t? And their contribution going forward? (for example if increasing OER will offset the fall in all the transitory measures that peaked and hold... Read More
Right now, the delta variant is the biggest wildcard to economic growth.... Read More
Ben Breitholtz: Everyone should really watch consumers’ search activity closely to get an indication of the economy’s path. For now, search activity for going-out topics are moderately improving in August despite the spreading Delta variant. Here’s the spread of search... Read More
Bianco Research Conference Call Takeaways From Camp Kotok Replay The replay of our August 19, 2021 conference call titled Takeaways From Camp Kotok here. Jim Bianco joins Fox Business to discuss Delta?s impact on the economy, Cryptocurrencies & Inflation Ben... Read More
Ben Breitholtz: Fortunately, consumers’ search activity for going-out and staying-in topics has rebounded into August. Searches had peaked in late March and then troughed in June. Not (yet) seeing signs of a lasting, material slowdown in consumers’ intentions. Twitter: Carl... Read More