Head of Canada’s Mortgage & Housing Agency Warns Home Buyers to Question Motives of Those Saying Prices Will Rise by Stephen Punwasi • Jun 1, 2020 • 75 Comments “They’re whistling past the graveyard and offering no analysis.”
San Francisco, Epitome of the “Everything Bubble,” Faces Fiscal Chaos. Boom-and-Bust, Always. Now is the Bust by Wolf Richter • May 31, 2020 • 170 Comments “I’ve stopped defining worst-case scenarios because they keep getting worse every week”: San Francisco’s controller.
Automakers’ Finance Divisions Lobby BoE & UK Gov for Bailout. Auto Sales Collapse 97%, Consumers Apply for Payment Holiday by Nick Corbishley • May 31, 2020 • 44 Comments But auto sales had already dropped three years in a row — before Covid.
From Ice-Cold to Hot: Daily Pending Home Sales in May so Far, 15 Cities Around the US by Wolf Richter • May 30, 2020 • 130 Comments A near-real-time roller-coaster of home sales during the pandemic via charts.
After Decade of Retail Investors Getting Systematically Wiped Out, SEC & CFTC Investigate Oil ETF USO Investor Risk Disclosure by Wolf Richter • May 30, 2020 • 88 Comments What took them so long? And while they’re at it, they should also investigate US Natural Gas Fund UNG.
Fed Tapered QE Helicopter Money for Wall Street Further: MBS Fell. Treasuries Barely Rose. Liquidity Swaps & Repos Stalled. by Wolf Richter • May 29, 2020 • 70 Comments But one of the Fed’s “13(3) Facilities,” managed by State Street, jumped.
No, Homes Did Not Sell Like Hotcakes: “Pending Home Sales” Plunged 34% in April, a Preview of “Closed Sales” in May by Wolf Richter • May 28, 2020 • 180 Comments The housing market faces ferocious headwinds.
Week 10 of the U.S. Labor Market Collapse: Still Getting Worse at Gut-Wrenching Pace, But Signs of Bottom Appear by Wolf Richter • May 28, 2020 • 90 Comments Gig workers weigh. PUA and “Initial Claims” surge. But millions of other workers got their jobs back. Here are the “Insured Unemployment Rates” for each state, topping out at 30%.
Commercial Real Estate in the Plague Year: The Office Tower Landscape is About to Be Remade by John McNellis • May 28, 2020 • 99 Comments The elevator in a pandemic, and the accidental discovery that many businesses are 90% efficient with employees working from home.
4th-Largest US Rental Car Company, Advantage, Files for Bankruptcy: 3rd Time in Decade, Hertz & Private Equity Written All Over It by Wolf Richter • May 27, 2020 • 67 Comments The “bare bones” petition is a sign that “something was about to happen.” Pressure piles on the used-vehicle wholesale market.