Retail Sales, Jobs, Inflation, Conversation starters, Boomer stuff, the Debt Limit and Presidents Day
Retail Sales, Jobs, Inflation and Jerry
Tuesday - The Chair of the Federal Reserve, Jerome Powell, made the following statement to Congress: “We’re in a pretty good place with this economy. We want to make more progress on inflation. And we think our policy rate is in a good place, and we don’t see any reason to be in a hurry to reduce it further.”
That means they won’t be reducing interest rates anytime soon.
Wednesday: As if to cement that thinking, the CPI – Consumer Price Index - for January came out.
The overall CPI was up 0.5% for the month and 3.0% for the last 12 months.
Price increases in gas and eggs drove this.
Curse you, bird flu virus!!!
Expectations were 0.3% and 2.8%, respectively.
The core CPI, which excludes food and fuel, was up 0.4% for the month. Ouch. For the year, it was up 3.3%. Double ouch.
Expectations were for 0.3% and 3.1%. As Maxwell Smart would say, “Missed it by that much.”
Yep, the Fed is NOT reducing interest rates anytime soon.
FYI, the 10-year treasury is at 4.47%. You can pick up a one-year CD online for 4.3%, with money market rates at 4.75%.
Thursday: To poke a hole in whatever balloon was left at the Fed, retail sales fell 0.9%. Expectations were that it would fall 0.2%. Those sure exceeded expectations, but not in a good way.
Well, the after-Christmas crowd did not show up in January due to wildfires and very cold weather in the Midwest and South.
And car sales were down too. It’s tough to take a test drive in the snow.
Coming up this week, initial jobless claims are expected to be 215,000, and the manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index – PMI – is expected to come in at 50.7.
Anything less than 50 means they are not optimistic. Hold your breath…
Conversation Starter Headlines
Realtor.Com leaves California, setting up headquarters in Texas – Austin, Texas. With a glut of office space in Austin, it’s cheaper there. They should know.
Spotify Logs First Full-Year Profit – “It only took us 18 years to get here, but we’re here.” Said the Spotify CEO. Well, that’s accountability. Give me 18 years, and I’m pretty sure I can hit any business goal you give me.
Bonus Question: Without googling, how did Spotify get its name?
U.S. Distillers Wrestle with Bourbon Decline – sales volume dropped 1.2% in 2023, the first drop since 2002.
Tequila Prices Slip as Demand Softens – sales of agave-based liquors like tequila and mescal were flat in 2024.
Tequila is the second most popular liquor after vodka.
The once reliable boomers and Gen Xers are realizing that more than one drink now gives them a headache. And no one wants to pay for that.
And Zer’s are being told that it's not healthy to drink.
Meta to Eliminate 5% of Staff; CEO vows to ‘Raise the Bar’ – I expect that means performance rather than spirits. I’m guessing the on-staff masseuse may be on the way out and NFL players on the way in…
Ex-NFL Players Tackle Office Politics – Former professional athletes are coveted employees at companies seeking toughness, loyalty, and winning mindsets. Sounds like they should apply at Meta.
For the Over 50 Crowd
A Massachusetts Institute of Technology team studied millions of American companies that were started between 2007 and 2014.
The average age of the founders was almost 42.
Honestly, I think this might be skewed by the hundreds of thousands of folks who were forced to hang up their own shingle when they lost their job in the recession, but why ruin a good story...
For venture capitalist Katerina Stroponiati, the minimum CEO age for her fund is 50. She likes folks with experience.
That shows that it’s never too late.
This is just another reminder that youth and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery.
Says the boomer.
Fire Update
Employers can give tax-free aid to workers impacted by the wildfires, such as paying for personal expenses, family living, or funeral costs.
It assumes the assistance does not replace or supplement wages.
These are qualified disaster assistance payments and are tax-free to the workers, are deductible by the employer, and they are not hit with payroll taxes.
The Debt Limit
What happens when your paycheck isn’t enough to cover your expenses and your credit cards are maxed out?
Just ask the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
In this case, the credit card limit is $36,000,000,000,000.
Yes, that is the right number of zeroes. That is what $36 trillion looks like.
That makes your share of the debt $137,404. That’s for each person 18 or older. I checked the math three times.
Well, the U.S. Treasury can get by for a little while, but by Father’s Day, there is going to be a reckoning.
It’s going to be interesting to see how congress gets this squared away.
As most of the clickbait articles say, Buckle Up!
It’s Presidents Day! That’s why your banker is not picking up their phones. And you won’t get any mail.
Presidents' Day, officially Washington's Birthday at the federal governmental level, is a U.S. holiday in the United States celebrated on the third Monday of February. It is often celebrated to honor all those who served as presidents of the United States and, since 1879, has been the federal holiday honoring Founding Father George Washington.
Some little-known facts about the Presidents of the United States:
Not only was William Taft the 27th President of the United States, he was also Chief Justice of the Supreme Court and the first President to be buried at Arlington National Cemetery.
William Henry Harrison was the 9th President of the United States and the first to die in office; he had been President for only 31 days.
The youngest President at the inauguration was Theodore Roosevelt, at 42.
1776 is when the Declaration of Independence was signed, but the Constitutional Convention in 1789, 13 years later, established the means to elect a President of this brand-new country. That is why George Washington is considered the Father of the Nation; for his contributions to getting this Republic idea going.
And that’s your history lesson for the day.
The next Federal holiday is in May, but Easter is on April 20. Go figure; chocolate eggs may be cheaper than real eggs by then.
