The start of the Asian Conglomerates Series: we open with a look at the life of Stanley Ho, gambling king of Macau.

Topics, reading, and speakers.

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 2022.  Unfortunately, this impacts long term price comparisons since the new contract was priced about 24% higher than the old random length contract for the period when both contracts were available. On January 31, 2025, LBR was at $592.50 per 1000 board feet, up 6.4% from a year ago. Click on graph for larger image. There is somewhat of a seasonal demand for lumber, and lumber prices frequently peak in the first half of the year. But we might see an increase due to the tariffs on Canada.

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 in 2024): Occupancy: 54.3% (-3.4%) emphasis added The following graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four-week average. Click on graph for larger image. The 4-week average of the occupancy rate is tracking both last year and the median rate for the period 2000 through 2024 (Blue). Note: Y-axis doesn't start at zero to better show the seasonal change. This is the weakest period of the year for hotel occupancy and the 4-week average will increase seasonally for the next few months.