Building Financial Danger – January 7, 2013 Update

On October 17, 2011 I wrote a post titled “Danger Signs In The Stock Market, Financial System And Economy.”  This post is a brief 20th update to that post. My overall analysis indicates a continuing elevated and growing level of danger which contains  many worldwide and U.S.-specific “stresses” of a very complex nature. I have written numerous …

Read more

Average Hourly Earnings Trends

I have written many blog posts concerning the worrisome trends in income and earnings. Along these lines, one of the measures showing disconcerting trends is that of hourly earnings. While the concept of hourly earnings can be defined and measured in a variety of ways, below are a few charts that I believe broadly illustrate problematic …

Read more

U-3 And U-6 Unemployment Rate Long-Term Reference Charts As Of January 4, 2013

Shortly after each monthly employment report I have been posting a continual series titled “3 Critical Unemployment Charts.” Of course, there are many other employment charts that can be displayed as well. For reference purposes, below are the U-3 and U-6 Unemployment Rate charts from a long-term historical perspective.  Both charts are from the St. …

Read more

3 Critical Unemployment Charts – January 2013

As I have commented previously, as in the October 6, 2009 post (“A Note About Unemployment Statistics”), in my opinion the official methodologies used to measure the various job loss and unemployment statistics do not provide an accurate depiction; they serve to understate the severity of unemployment. However, even if one chooses to look at the …

Read more

St. Louis Financial Stress Index – January 3, 2013 Update

On March 28, 2011 I wrote a post (“The STLFSI“) about the  STLFSI (St. Louis Fed’s Financial Stress Index) which is supposed to measure stress in the financial system.  For reference purposes, the most recent chart is seen below.  This chart was last updated on January 3, incorporating data from December 31,1993 to December 28, …

Read more

Deflation Probabilities

While I do not agree with the current readings of the measure – I think the measure dramatically understates the probability of deflation, as measured by the CPI – the Atlanta Fed maintains an interesting data series titled “Deflation Probabilities.” As stated on the site: Using estimates derived from Treasury Inflation-Protected Securities (TIPS) markets, described …

Read more

Deloitte “CFO Signals” Report 4Q 2012 – Notable Aspects

Recently Deloitte released their “CFO Signals” “High-Level Summary” report for the 4th Quarter of 2012. As seen in page 2 of the report, “Eighty-six CFOs responded this quarter. Three fourths of the CFOs are from public companies, and 77% are from companies with more than $1B in annual revenue.” Here are some excerpts that I found notable: …

Read more

U.S. Dollar Decline – January 2, 2013 Update

U.S. Dollar weakness is a foremost concern of mine.  As such, I have extensively written about it.  I am very concerned that the actions being taken to “improve” our economic situation will dramatically weaken the Dollar.  Should the Dollar substantially decline from here, as I expect, the negative consequences will far outweigh any benefits.  The negative impact of a substantial …

Read more