Behind the Numbers had some interesting comments on the retail sector in this week’s Thursday Thoughts: Tuesday’s front page article in the WSJ did a nice job explaining how rising costs and shifting spending habits are stifling the consumer’s discretionary shopping. While such a premise may seem suspect in an environment of low inflation and…
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Consumer credit growth has been trending down down after peaking in July. Even with the backward revisions changing trends, this particular trend has been in play for two months now. In any event, year-over-year growth (ignoring student loans) is still growing at double the rate of consumer contribution to GDP growth. The headline said: In October,…
Podcast: Play in new window | Play in new window (Duration: 13:19 — 6.1MB) DOW + 58 = 17,985 SPX + 3 = 2075 NAS + 11 = 4780 10 YR YLD + .05 = 2.31% OIL – 1.12 = 65.69 GOLD – 15.50 = 1192.00 SILV – .20 = 16.39 Record highs for the Dow and the S&P…
When I speak about consumer credit the numbers represent the net increase in credit during the period not the aggregate amount.
Big Lots Inc. (BIG – Analyst Report) reported its third-quarter fiscal 2014 results wherein adjusted loss from continuing operations of 6 cents per share came in a penny wider than the Zacks Consensus Estimate of a loss of 5 cents. Revenues of $1,107.1 million fell short of the Zacks Consensus Estimate of $1,121 million. Further,…
A 40% haircut to oil prices has the market up in arms, ignoring everything that actually matters. While everyone focuses on how far or how quick oil will move, we’ve set our focus on profiting from the fall in oil. Here’s how. The move in oil prices has been quick and quite violent. You likely…
The Chart of the Day belongs to ACE Ltd. (NYSE:ACE). I found the stock by sorting the ACE Ltd. list for the stocks having the most frequent new highs in the last month then used the Flipchart feature to review the charts. Since the Trend Spotter signaled a buy on 10/24 the stock gained 8.58%….
Wall Street has for some time attempted to put taxpayers on the hook for its derivatives trades. I highlighted this a year ago in the post: Citigroup Written Legislation Moves Through the House of Representatives. Here’s an excerpt: Five years after the Wall Street coup of 2008, it appears the U.S. House of Representatives is as bought…
The numbers are in, and they are telling us that Black Friday weekend doesn’t matter as much anymore, and it doesn’t necessarily kick off the holiday shopping season as it once did. We think there are three culprits for the changing face of the Black Friday shopping event, and certain companies that are poised to…
