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Posts Tagged ‘inflation’

Mid-May Economic Nuggets Report with Focus on Retail Sales, Inflation and Housing Starts

Wednesday, May 19th, 2021

Article source: ConstructConnect

In this, the latest mid-month Nuggets report, I’ll focus on three major and interlocking (or interdependent) economic indicators: retail sales, inflation and housing starts.

Retail Sales

My world of economic analysis is being rocked in unprecedented fashion. Maybe ‘shattered’ is the better word.

For example, I’m used to studying year-over-year percentage changes to gain an understanding of what is going on in certain segments of the economy. Retail sales is a perfect example. In current dollar terms (i.e., not adjusted for inflation), they used to range from flat as a lower boundary to maybe +7% y/y as an upper limit.

When the coronavirus first struck in the Spring of last year, retail sales plummeted, yielding double-digit percentage-change drops for ‘total’ and many shopkeeper sub-categories. Now, a year later, the rebound that’s underway is being vastly exaggerated by the comparison with 2020’s deeply distressed results. Looking at April 2021/April 2020, we’re dealing with ‘funhouse’ numbers on the upside.

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Ten Mid-February Economic Nuggets – With a Focus on Inflation Fears

Thursday, March 1st, 2018

Article source: ConstructConnect

At the beginning of February, there was a great deal of volatility in the U.S. major stock market indices. They fell into ‘correction’ territory, which in ‘market-talk’ means they dropped by 10% from their peaks, before steadying and heading cautiously upwards again.

Ten Mid-February Economic Nuggets Graphic

Some of the initial downward movement was due to profit-taking, on the heels of years of exceptional equity price gains. As the retreat grew more severe, however, it became harder to explain, especially since the recently passed tax cuts will provide an extra boost to corporate bottom lines.

A consensus explanation gradually emerged and it goes as follows. Yes, the economy is growing rapidly and job creation is outstanding. But maybe output growth and labor market conditions are too good. The level of unemployment has dropped near a historical low. Can wage restraint hold? Furthermore, there is a synchronous world expansion underway and commodities demand is heating up. Prices for key raw materials are climbing once again.

All these developments have the potential to light a fire under inflation. And if inflation is on the rise, the Federal Reserve may feel the need to initiate ‘cooling’ interest rate hikes faster than earlier anticipated. Some economic forecasting firms are already projecting there will be four, not three, interest rate increases this year.

Therefore, perhaps the hottest topic for discussion throughout 2018 will be how inflation is performing. Specifically, is the ‘Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U)’ busting free from its +2.0% (year over year) bondage and raising more havoc?

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