QE Unwinds: Fed’s Assets Drop for 3rd Week, Another -$76 Billion. 3-Week Total: -$163 Billion

by Wolf Richter • Jul 3, 2020 • 65 Comments

Fed shifts to propping up consumption by businesses and governments, and away from propping up asset prices.

Never Before Have I Seen So Much Fake Unemployment & Jobs Data by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Labor Department Nails It

by Wolf Richter • Jul 2, 2020 • 181 Comments

Labor Department today: People on state & federal unemployment insurance jumped to 31.5 million, worst ever.
Bureau of Labor Statistics today: 4.8 million jobs created, unemployment dropped by 3.2 million.
BLS under-reported unemployment by 13.7 million, based on data from the Labor Department. What’s happening is infuriating. Read and cringe.

Despite New Gigafactory in China, Tesla’s Global Deliveries Drop 4.8% in Q2, Much Worse Than I Expected

by Wolf Richter • Jul 2, 2020 • 79 Comments

Hahahaha, that should have been the universal headline.

Massive Shifts Underway, Rental Market Reacts in Near-Real Time: Rents Plunge in San Francisco & Oil Patch, Drop in Expensive Cities. But Long List of Double-Digit Gainers

by Wolf Richter • Jul 1, 2020 • 102 Comments

Rents in San Francisco are still crazy-overpriced.

Double-WTF Chart of the Year Update: Tesla Becomes Most Valuable Automaker, Blows by Toyota

by Wolf Richter • Jul 1, 2020 • 167 Comments

To mark this moment in the history of insane stock prices where a tiny automaker with a global market share of 0.5% and a big loss in 2019 became the most valuable automaker in the world.

UK House Prices in June Fall for First Time Since 2012, Mortgage Approvals Slump to Record Low Despite Reopening

by Nick Corbishley • Jul 1, 2020 • 13 Comments

Still waiting for the “Pent-up Demand.”

There Sure’s a Lot of Brain-Dead Misreporting About the Case-Shiller Home Price Index this Morning

by Wolf Richter • Jun 30, 2020 • 131 Comments

No, it’s not yet a reflection of home prices during the Pandemic. Be patient. Reporters or spaghetti-code algos should have read the methodology before misleading their readers.

Who Will Get Hit When Collateralized Loan Obligations (CLOs) Blow Up? Banks or Unsuspecting “Market Participants”?

by Wolf Richter • Jun 29, 2020 • 55 Comments

Answers emerge from the murky business of CLOs.

Negative-Interest Rate Champion Bank of France Now Frets About Ballooning Corporate Debt

by Nick Corbishley • Jun 29, 2020 • 33 Comments

Central-Bank Forked-Tongue Syndrome.

Pending Home Sales Bounce Off Brutal Low, Still -11% from February, -5% from May Last Year

by Wolf Richter • Jun 29, 2020 • 127 Comments

The market is facing a historic mess.

Fed Discloses it Bought Tiny Amounts of Corporate Bonds, Including a Whopping $15.5 Million (with an M) in Junk Bonds

by Wolf Richter • Jun 28, 2020 • 83 Comments

Here are the 84 companies whose bonds the Fed bought, and the 16 bond ETFs it now holds.

What’s in Beijing’s Mystery Security Law Will Be a Giant Tell about Hong Kong’s Future

by Chris Oliver • Jun 28, 2020 • 45 Comments

Sense of Foreboding in Hong Kong. Beijing’s black-box approach doesn’t bode well for local freedoms.

World Trade Plunges. Here’s Why it’s Even Worse in Reality: China’s Deep-Fake Data Comes to Light

by Wolf Richter • Jun 27, 2020 • 225 Comments

But the downturn in the goods-based sectors started in 2018. US exports are now down 37% from that peak, imports down 25%.

Mall Giant Intu Collapses Into Bankruptcy

by Nick Corbishley • Jun 26, 2020 • 65 Comments

A zombie well before the pandemic, the UK company had racked up huge debts to finance rapid growth in a sector that had started shrinking some time ago.

A Federal-Money-from-the-Sky Story

by Wolf Richter • Jun 26, 2020 • 151 Comments

Household Income Drops from Historic Spike, Spending Bounces off Historic Plunge But Remains Low. Income from wages & salaries remains crushed.

Plagued Retail: My View from the Trenches

by John McNellis • Jun 25, 2020 • 113 Comments

We’ve lost half-dozen retailers — restaurants, clothing, massage… Tenants who in effect said, sue me, I’m taking a hike. And replacement shop tenants are just behind spotted owls on the endangered species list.

“V-Shaped” Recovery Not Now: It Gets Worse, 30.55 Million on Unemployment. Week 14 of U.S. Labor Market Collapse

by Wolf Richter • Jun 25, 2020 • 115 Comments

Had a setback. Over 11 million gig workers on unemployment insurance. But four states, including Florida, still can’t process federal PUA claims.

Business Uncertainty About Sales Goes Haywire

by Wolf Richter • Jun 24, 2020 • 90 Comments

These Charts Show What Mess Businesses Face Going Forward.

Barcelona’s Epic Tourism Boom Is Over, Now the Crisis Begins: My Walk to the Beach

by Nick Corbishley • Jun 24, 2020 • 92 Comments

Owner of a small cafe that specializes in fine cakes and sandwiches tells me: “We’ll be lucky if we get half the normal number in July and August.” It’s now “all about damage control.”

Wild Ride to Nowhere Since Jan 2018: What the US Stock Market Looks Like Minus APPL, MSFT, AMZN, GOOG, FB

by Wolf Richter • Jun 23, 2020 • 144 Comments

Entire market of 3,451 stocks minus “Giant 5” is down 1% from Jan 2018. But wow, the volatility! You would have been better off with a despicable freaking savings account.

Sales of New Houses Rose Off Multi-Year Low, as Sales of Existing Houses & Especially Condos Plunged. What Gives?

by Wolf Richter • Jun 23, 2020 • 72 Comments

If the pandemic changed where Americans want to live – dense urban centers or suburbs – it will be one of the most far-reaching developments.

Massive Credit Losses to Hit European Banks in Q2 and into 2021, Particularly When Debt Moratoriums Are Lifted

by Nick Corbishley • Jun 23, 2020 • 20 Comments

But the ECB went into high gear to soothe the pain of the banks.

Plot Thickens on End of QE & Start of Shedding Assets

by Wolf Richter • Jun 22, 2020 • 82 Comments

Fed leads in trimming its balance sheet; Now Bank of England governor publishes the reasoning for central banks to shed assets – before raising interest rates. A big shift!

Home Sales Plunged Most since 2008, Condos -41%. First-Ever April-May Price Drop in Normally Red-Hot Spring Selling Season

by Wolf Richter • Jun 22, 2020 • 172 Comments

First signs of a very slow-moving mess.

Latin-America’s Airlines Are Crashing, But There May Be No Bailouts. Aeromexico Denies Filing for US Bankruptcy

by Nick Corbishley • Jun 21, 2020 • 27 Comments

The AMLO government, which has refused to bail out shareholders and bondholders of large companies, could be on to something: A form of capitalism where investors, not taxpayers, carry the risks.

Alitalia, Lufthansa, Condor, Norwegian, Other European Airlines Try to Survive, But it Gets Complicated

by MC01 • Jun 21, 2020 • 75 Comments

It’s all about money, but whose money?

I, Who Hates Shorting, Just Shorted the Entire Stock Market. Here’s Why

by Wolf Richter • Jun 19, 2020 • 429 Comments

I’m sharing this trade for your future entertainment so you can hail me as the obliterating moron that infamously shorted the greatest rally floating weightlessly ever higher above the worst economic and corporate crisis imaginable.

Fed Ends QE, Total Assets Drop. Liquidity Injection Ends

by Wolf Richter • Jun 18, 2020 • 148 Comments

The Big Shift: Fed shifts to propping up consumption rather than asset prices.

Week 13 of the U.S. Labor Market Collapse: Week 3 of Recovery at Snail’s Pace Amid Data Chaos

by Wolf Richter • Jun 18, 2020 • 79 Comments

29.2 million people still claim unemployment insurance, gig workers 1/3 of total. Some states still not processing claims under federal programs. My “Reasonable Approximation” for the Unemployment Rate.

Update on the WTF Collapse of Demand for Gasoline, Jet Fuel, and Diesel

by Wolf Richter • Jun 17, 2020 • 121 Comments

No “V-shaped recovery back to normal.”