Credit Writedowns

The 98,000 jobs added to payrolls in the US in March were well below the consensus estimate of 178,000, especially when you consider downward revisions to January and February totalled 38,000. I don’t believe this matters for the Fed…

The consensus for the March jobs report is for an addition of 178,000 jobs. The unemployment rate is expected to remain unchanged at 4.7%. Other data show the risk is to the upside here.

A couple of days ago, a study released by Nature Nanotechnology said a new graphene filter could be a major step forward in removing salt from seawater and making it safe for drinking

What about running down the balance sheet — reverse QE if you will? I think this is where the Fed minutes offered some new thinking.

I think I have the answer to at least one question: why was the Fed talking to big money investors in the first place. My thoughts follow below.

This is a follow-up on my entry water post from yesterday. The thesis here is that mergers will be a big part of the landscape as companies seek economies of scale and scope or vertically integrate to deliver water to their customers. But…

If water becomes a contentious issue, it will have geopolitical and military implications. And we would need to solve the water issue to prevent those implications from leading to nationalism and military confrontation.

US auto sales have been down persistently on a year-over-year basis during the past several months. March was no different, according to figures released today.

I have heard some people dismiss jobless claims as a data series for two distinct reasons that I want to flag given my view that claims data matter.

We are now three months into 2017 and we can look back on 2016 as a fairly good year economically for the US. So given that backdrop, was it right to worry about a recession in 2016? And what does that say about 2017? Here’s my view below.