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Musings on Markets
Data Update 6 for 2025: From Macro to Micro - The Hurdle Rate Question! In the first five posts, I have looked at the macro numbers that drive global markets, from interest...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
In the first five posts, I have looked at the macro numbers that drive global markets, from interest rates to risk premiums, but it is not my preferred habitat. I spend most of my time in the far less rarefied air of corporate finance and valuation, where businesses try to decide...
Calculated Risk
Schedule for Week of February 9, 2025 The key reports this week are January CPI and Retail sales. ----- Monday, February 10th ----- No...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
The key reports this week are January CPI and Retail sales. ----- Monday, February 10th ----- No major economic releases scheduled. ----- Tuesday, February 11th ----- 6:00 AM: NFIB Small Business Optimism Index for January. Testimony, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, Semiannual...
The Diff
De-Risking The 11-Figure Bets Plus! Thematic ETFs; Event-Driven Ads; Lagging Demand; Implementation; Labor Price Discrimination
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
Comments on January Employment Report The headline jobs number in the January employment report was below expectations, however, November...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
The headline jobs number in the January employment report was below expectations, however, November and December payrolls were revised up by 100,000 combined.   The participation rate and the employment population ratio increased, and the unemployment rate decreased to...
Mazdak
The 5-Step Blueprint to Achieve Financial Independence Imagine waking up every morning with the freedom to choose what you want to do—not because you have...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Imagine waking up every morning with the freedom to choose what you want to do—not because you have to work for money, but because you want to.
Musings on Markets
Data Update 5 for 2025: It's a small world, after all! If the title of this post sounds familiar, it is because is one of Disney’s most iconic rides, one...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
If the title of this post sounds familiar, it is because is one of Disney’s most iconic rides, one that I have taken hundreds of times, first with my own children and more recently, with my grandchildren. It is a mainstay of every Disney theme park, from the original Disneyland...
Calculated Risk
January Employment Preview On Friday at 8:30 AM ET, the BLS will release the employment report for January. The consensus is...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
On Friday at 8:30 AM ET, the BLS will release the employment report for January. The consensus is for 170,000 jobs added, and for the unemployment rate to be unchanged at 4.1%. IMPORTANT NOTE: For the household survey, new population controls will be used - and this will boost...
oftwominds-Charles...
The Crises Yet to Come "Controlling the narrative" to justify destabilizing asymmetries won't change the consequences. ...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
"Controlling the narrative" to justify destabilizing asymmetries won't change the consequences. That the Trump Reformation / Counter-Reformation is disrupting various nodes of the status quo is viewed as an existential crise by many. The choice between Reformation /...
Calculated Risk
MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increased Slightly in Q4 2024 Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increased Slightly...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increased Slightly in Q4 2024 A brief excerpt: From the MBA: Mortgage Delinquencies Increase in the Fourth Quarter of 2024 The delinquency rate for mortgage loans on one-to-four-unit residential...
The Diff
Short-Term Discretionary Traders Are Unusually Automatable Plus! Dimensions of Competition; Jurisdiction; Streaming Fragmentation; Diversification; Twitter...
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
Thursday: Unemployment Claims Note: Mortgage rates are from MortgageNewsDaily.com and are for top tier scenarios. initial weekly...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Note: Mortgage rates are from MortgageNewsDaily.com and are for top tier scenarios. initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released. The consensus is for a increase to 214 thousand from 207 thousand last week.
Mazdak
DeepSeek Ban in Australian, Google Reverses Stance on AI Weaponization, ... 1.
6 months ago
Citation Needed
Issue 76 – Tripartisan legislation Crypto exchanges face legal troubles, and Trump’s crypto empire grows as regulations are slashed and...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Crypto exchanges face legal troubles, and Trump’s crypto empire grows as regulations are slashed and enforcement is sidelined.
Calculated Risk
The Changing Mix of Light Vehicle Sales An update: The first graph below shows the mix of sales since 1976 (Blue is cars, Red is light...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
An update: The first graph below shows the mix of sales since 1976 (Blue is cars, Red is light trucks and SUVs) through January 2025. Click on graph for larger image. Over time the mix has changed toward more and more light trucks and SUVs.  Only when oil prices are high, does...
Mazdak
Google Releases Gemini 2.0 Flash Google is making bold moves in the AI space with the release of Gemini 2.0, a series of advanced AI...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Google is making bold moves in the AI space with the release of Gemini 2.0, a series of advanced AI models designed to challenge industry leaders like OpenAI, Microsoft, Meta, and Anthropic.
Calculated Risk
Asking Rents Mostly Unchanged Year-over-year Today, in the Real Estate Newsletter: Asking Rents Mostly Unchanged Year-over-year Brief excerpt:...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Today, in the Real Estate Newsletter: Asking Rents Mostly Unchanged Year-over-year Brief excerpt: Another monthly update on rents. Apartment List: Asking Rent Growth -0.5% Year-over-year ... On the supply side of the rental market, our national vacancy index ticked up to 6.9...
Commoncog
The Study of Asian Tycoons What can we learn from the study of Asian conglomerates, and the small group of tycoons that control...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
What can we learn from the study of Asian conglomerates, and the small group of tycoons that control them?
Calculated Risk
ISM® Services Index Decreases to 52.8% in January (Posted with permission). The ISM® Services index was at 52.8%, down from 54.0% last month. The...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
(Posted with permission). The ISM® Services index was at 52.8%, down from 54.0% last month. The employment index increased to 52.3%, from 51.3%. Note: Above 50 indicates expansion, below 50 in contraction. Services PMI® at 52.8% January 2025 Services ISM® Report On...
Moneyness
Trump claims US banks can't open in Canada—US banks disagree In what seems to be an effort to extort Canada for additional benefits, Donald Trump complained...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
In what seems to be an effort to extort Canada for additional benefits, Donald Trump complained yesterday on social media that CANADA DOESN'T EVEN ALLOW U.S. BANKS TO OPEN OR DO BUSINESS THERE. And so according to Trump, Canada doubly deserves to be disciplined with...
Calculated Risk
Heavy Truck Sales Increased 5% YoY in January This graph shows heavy truck sales since 1967 using data from the BEA. The dashed line is the...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
This graph shows heavy truck sales since 1967 using data from the BEA. The dashed line is the January 2025 seasonally adjusted annual sales rate (SAAR) of 534 thousand. Click on graph for larger image. Heavy truck sales declined sharply at the beginning of the pandemic, falling...
Mazdak
LinkedIn Goes All In on Vertical Video For years, platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts have dominated the short-form...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
For years, platforms like TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts have dominated the short-form video space.
Calculated Risk
Fannie and Freddie: Single Family Serious Delinquency Rates Increased in December Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Fannie and Freddie: Single Family Serious...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Fannie and Freddie: Single Family Serious Delinquency Rates Increased in December Freddie Mac reported that the Single-Family serious delinquency rate in December was 0.59%, up from 0.56% November. Freddie's rate is up...
The Diff
AI Interfaces Engineer Serendipity Plus! Third-Order Consequences; A Sovereign Wealth Fund; Artificial Celebrities; Don't Call It...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Plus! Third-Order Consequences; A Sovereign Wealth Fund; Artificial Celebrities; Don't Call It Sports Betting; Retaliatory Tariffs
Calculated Risk
BLS: Job Openings Decreased to 7.6 million in December From the BLS: Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary The number of job openings decreased to 7.6...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
From the BLS: Job Openings and Labor Turnover Summary The number of job openings decreased to 7.6 million on the last business day of December, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Over the month, hires and total separations were little changed at 5.5 million...
FIRE v London
My exits – a post mortem Readers will know that I dabble with active investing – I pick stocks. Lord, make me passive, but...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Readers will know that I dabble with active investing – I pick stocks. Lord, make me passive, but not yet Rather like The Investor at Monevator, I firmly believe in the merits of low cost index tracking as an investment strategy, but I also enjoy the thrills / intellectual...
Calculated Risk
Tuesday: Job Openings From Matthew Graham at Mortgage News Daily: Mortgage Rates Stay Flat Despite Underlying Market...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
From Matthew Graham at Mortgage News Daily: Mortgage Rates Stay Flat Despite Underlying Market Volatility We know that mortgage rates are driven by financial markets and we know that financial markets have experienced volatility amid the roll-out of new tariffs over the weekend....
oftwominds-Charles...
Lots of Solutions, But for Which Problems? If the "solutions" being offered are features of self-liquidating systems, they aren't solutions,...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
If the "solutions" being offered are features of self-liquidating systems, they aren't solutions, they're problems. Problems, problems, problems. No worries, we have solutions. Solutions abound, but the question is: are they actually resolving the core problems, or are...
Calculated Risk
Vehicles Sales Decrease to 15.60 million SAAR in January Wards Auto released their estimate of light vehicle sales for January: U.S. Light-Vehicle Sales...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Wards Auto released their estimate of light vehicle sales for January: U.S. Light-Vehicle Sales Start 2025 With 4% Increase in January (pay site). There did not appear to be an end-of-month boost in demand, either as a rebound from the mid-month weather-related losses or...
The Diff
The Bid/Ask Spread for Top Talent Plus! De Minimis; ARR; Jurisdictions; Forward-Deployed Engineers; Software and Hardware; Diff Jobs
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
Construction Spending Increased 0.5% in December From the Census Bureau reported that overall construction spending increased: Construction spending...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
From the Census Bureau reported that overall construction spending increased: Construction spending during December 2024 was estimated at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of $2,192.2 billion, 0.5 percent above the revised November estimate of $2,180.3 billion. The December...
oftwominds-Charles...
Begging Bowl '25: I'm Looking for Two Readers Willing to Help Me Buy a New Thrift-Store Shirt The goal is to move incrementally toward a kind of happiness that actually makes us happy. That's...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
The goal is to move incrementally toward a kind of happiness that actually makes us happy. That's the goal of my work. I admire unvarnished honesty, which is scarce. And like everything else that's increasingly scarce, it behooves us to hoard our stash. In the unvarnished...
balajis.com
Network School Curriculum Topics, reading, and speakers.
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
Hotels: Occupancy Rate Decreased 3.4% Year-over-year From STR: U.S. hotel results for week ending 25 January As expected with the MLK Day holiday, the...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
From STR: U.S. hotel results for week ending 25 January As expected with the MLK Day holiday, the U.S. hotel industry reported mixed year-over-year comparisons, according to CoStar’s latest data through 25 January. ... 119-25 January 2025 (percentage change from comparable week...
Commoncog
The Gambling King The start of the Asian Conglomerates Series: we open with a look at the life of Stanley Ho, gambling...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
The start of the Asian Conglomerates Series: we open with a look at the life of Stanley Ho, gambling king of Macau.
Calculated Risk
Update: Lumber Prices Up 6% YoY This might be something to watch again. Here is another monthly update on lumber prices. SPECIAL...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
This might be something to watch again. Here is another monthly update on lumber prices. SPECIAL NOTE: The CME group discontinued the Random Length Lumber Futures contract on May 16, 2023.  I switched to a physically-delivered Lumber Futures contract that was started in August...
The Diff
Longreads + Open Thread Radio, Startups, History, Bally's, Dead Internet, Caesars
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
Schedule for Week of February 2, 2025 The key reports scheduled for this week are the January employment report and the December trade...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
The key reports scheduled for this week are the January employment report and the December trade deficit​. ----- Monday, February 3rd ----- 10:00 AM: ISM Manufacturing Index for January. The consensus is for the ISM to be at 49.5, up from 49.3 in December. 10:00 AM:...
Mazdak
OpenAI Launches o3-mini: A Faster, More Affordable AI Reasoning Model OpenAI has just unveiled o3-mini, the latest addition to its "reasoning" model family.
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
Initial Q1 GDP Tracking: Mid-to-high 2% Range From Goldman: We launched our Q1 GDP tracking estimate at +2.6% (quarter-over-quarter annualized)...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
From Goldman: We launched our Q1 GDP tracking estimate at +2.6% (quarter-over-quarter annualized) and our Q1 domestic final sales estimate at +2.3%. We launched our past-quarter GDP tracking estimate at +2.3%, in line with the advance reading. [Jan 31st estimate] emphasis...
Musings on Markets
DeepSeek crashes the AI Party: Story Break, Change or Shift? I am going to start this post with a confession that my knowledge of the architecture and mechanics...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
I am going to start this post with a confession that my knowledge of the architecture and mechanics of AI are pedestrian and that there will be things that I don't get right in this post. That said, DeepSeek's abrupt entry into the AI conversation has the potential to change the...
oftwominds-Charles...
AI Is a Digital Parrot: Word-Traps, False Logic and the Illusion of Intelligence Word traps and false logic don't lead to dominance of the future or monopolistic grips on limitless...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Word traps and false logic don't lead to dominance of the future or monopolistic grips on limitless profits. The heart of the current euphoric expectations for AI is a simple but problematic proposition: the equivalence of function equals intelligence. If using natural...
Calculated Risk
Freddie Mac House Price Index Increased in December; Up 4.0% Year-over-year Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Freddie Mac House Price Index Increased in...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Freddie Mac House Price Index Increased in December; Up 4.0% Year-over-year A brief excerpt: Freddie Mac reported that its “National” Home Price Index (FMHPI) increased 0.54% month-over-month on a seasonally adjusted (SA)...
The Diff
Capital-Intensity and Legibility Plus! AI as Half an Interface; Network Effects and Boycotts; OpenAI and Structure; Strategic...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Plus! AI as Half an Interface; Network Effects and Boycotts; OpenAI and Structure; Strategic Reserves; Meta says Yes to Jevons
Calculated Risk
Personal Income increased 0.4% in December; Spending increased 0.7% The BEA released the Personal Income and Outlays report for December: Personal income increased...
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6 months ago
The BEA released the Personal Income and Outlays report for December: Personal income increased $92.0 billion (0.4 percent at a monthly rate) in December, according to estimates released today by the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis. Disposable personal income (DPI)—personal...
The Diff
Test-Time Compute Scaling Drives the AI Jevons Paradox Plus! AI Price Discrimination; Openness; Disclosure; Arbitrage; Meta
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
BEA: Real GDP increased at 2.3% Annualized Rate in Q4 From the BEA: Gross Domestic Product, 4th Quarter and Year 2024 (Advance Estimate) Real gross...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
From the BEA: Gross Domestic Product, 4th Quarter and Year 2024 (Advance Estimate) Real gross domestic product (GDP) increased at an annual rate of 2.3 percent in the fourth quarter of 2024 (October, November, and December), according to the advance estimate released by the U.S....
oftwominds-Charles...
The AI Fad Just Burned to the Waterline Sometimes wide moats and billions of dollars to blow lead not to glory but to hubris, which beckons...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Sometimes wide moats and billions of dollars to blow lead not to glory but to hubris, which beckons Nemesis. While everyone was busy reassuring themselves the stock market was still A-OK, the driver of the market--the AI fad--just burned to the waterline. Yes, the current...
Mazdak
U.S. Copyright Office Rules on AI: What It Means for Creators and Businesses Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming creative industries, but it has also raised serious...
6 months ago
Calculated Risk
Inflation Adjusted House Prices 1.1% Below 2022 Peak; Price-to-rent index is 7.8% below 2022 peak Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Inflation Adjusted House Prices 1.1% Below...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
Today, in the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter: Inflation Adjusted House Prices 1.1% Below 2022 Peak It has been over 18 years since the housing bubble peak. In the November Case-Shiller house price index released yesterday, the seasonally adjusted National Index (SA), was...
Mazdak
OpenAI vs. DeepSeek: The AI Arms Race Heats Up The battle for artificial intelligence supremacy has taken a new turn, and it’s raising major...
6 months ago
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6 months ago
The battle for artificial intelligence supremacy has taken a new turn, and it’s raising major concerns about intellectual property, competition, and the future of AI development.