Standard & Poors S&P500 Earnings Estimates For 2011 & 2012

As many are aware, Standard & Poors publishes earnings estimates for the S&P500.  (My previous posts concerning their estimates can be found in the under the S&P500 Earnings tag) Currently, their estimates for 2011 add to the following: -From a “bottom up” perspective, operating earnings of $98.06/share -From a “top down” perspective, operating earnings of $94.89/share …

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Americans’ Financial Capacity

Recently a NBER Working Paper (#17072) was released titled “Financially Fragile Households:  Evidence and Implications.” There are various notable statistics and findings in the paper.  From the abstract: This paper examines households’ financial fragility by looking at their capacity to come up with $2,000 in 30 days. Using data from the 2009 TNS Global Economic …

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Updates On Economic Indicators May 2011

Here is an update on various indicators that are supposed to predict and/or depict economic activity.  These indicators have been discussed in previous blog posts: The May Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI)(pdf) updated as of May 23, 2011: – The Consumer Metrics Institute Contraction Watch: – The USA TODAY/IHS Global Insight Economic Outlook Index: An excerpt …

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Walmart’s Q12012 Results – Comments

I found various notable items in Walmart’s Q1 conference call transcript (pdf) dated May 17, 2011.  I view Walmart’s results as particularly noteworthy given their retail prominence and focus on low prices.  I have previously commented on their quarterly results. Here are various excerpts that I find most notable: comments from Mike Duke, from page 7: “Despite improvements in …

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Federal Reserve Economic Projections To 2013 And Beyond – As Of April 2011

The following is from the Minutes of The Federal Open Market Committee of April 26-27, 2011, the Summary of Economic Projections.  As stated: “In conjunction with the April 26-27, 2011, Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting, the members of the Board of Governors and the presidents of the Federal Reserve Banks, all of whom participate in …

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Philadelphia Fed – 2nd Quarter 2011 Survey Of Professional Forecasters

The Philadelphia Fed Second Quarter 2011 Survey of Professional Forecasters was released on May 13.  This survey is somewhat unique in various regards, such as it incorporates a longer time frame for various measures. The survey shows, among many measures, the following expectations: GDP: full-year 2011 : 2.7% full-year 2012 : 3.0% full-year 2013 : 2.8% …

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The May 2011 Wall Street Journal Economic Forecast Survey

The May Wall Street Journal Economic Forecast Survey was published May 16, 2011.  The headline is “Economists in Survey Discount Inflation.” Most of the article discusses inflation expectations, although raising the debt ceiling and other topics are touched upon as well. The current average forecasts among economists polled include the following: GDP: full-year 2011 : …

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