The estimated US Cash Deficit for August 2017 came in at $158B, $7B higher than last August as revenue faltered and outlays were up a smidge. Looking at the YTD revenues are running 3.3% higher while outlays are running 2.1% higher, and at $460B, the deficit through 8 months is 16B under last year’s $476B. […]

Junk Bonds do a fairly good job of confirming the short-term trend. At the moment, this chart is saying that the short-term uptrend is intact, but that it is time to watch for signs of the next downturn. New 52-week lows are well below the level where they indicate selling pressure. The bullish percents are […]

Equifax reports hackers accessed up to 143 million US consumers’ information. Equifax discovered the breach on July 29. Equifax discovered the breach on July 29. Just today, the public finds out about the breach. In the interim, three Equifax executives dumped about $1.8 million in Equifax shares. Hey, why not? It’s only a “small percentage” […]

Can we finally put to rest all notions that the US economy is at full employment and doing well, and therefore wage inflation is right around the corner? I suspect not. This dance has been ongoing for years now, continuing through what was nearly a recession, so there is little reason to believe that economists […]

Auto Sales Weak In Beige Book The Fed’s Beige Book report was released Wednesday. That’s where the Fed gives its update on how it sees the economy now and where it might be going in the future. The key term was that there is modest to moderate growth which Steve Liesman says means 2% growth. […]