Financial Review

Probably a Preview

Sinclair Noe — September 14, 2016

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DOW – 31 = 18,034
SPX – 1 = 2125
NAS + 18 = 5173
10 Y – .04 = 1.69%
OIL – 1.26 = 43.64
GOLD + 4.20 = 1323.60

Wall Street edged lower, and trading seemed calm compared to the past few days. The S&P 500 remains down almost 3 percent from before a steep selloff on Friday, even though interest rate futures indicate expectations for a rate hike at the Fed’s Sept. 20-21 meeting are still low. What we are seeing is probably a preview for what will happen when the Fed does raise rates.

Monsanto has finally agreed to a takeover offer from Bayer, valuing it at $128 per share or a total of more than $66 billion, ending months of wrangling after increasing its bid for a third time. The deal would be the largest all-cash transaction on record and put a quarter of the combined world market for seeds and pesticides under one roof. Bayer has also settled on a $2 billion break-up fee for the deal, which could close by the end of 2017.

The Monsanto-Bayer deal will face anti-trust scrutiny. Last year Monsanto tried to buy Syngenta, but the Swiss company fended off the attempt, only to agree later to a takeover by China’s state-owned ChemChina. Elsewhere in the industry, U.S. chemicals giants Dow Chemical and DuPont plan to merge and later spin off their respective seeds and crop chemicals operations into a major agribusiness.

Here’s why it matters to you: the consolidation of two big industry players into one of the world’s largest agrochemical firms may limit farmers’ choices and bargaining power, with increasing seed prices expected to be passed on to the grocery aisles. Regulators are likely to take a dim view of so many Big Ag deals happening at once.

If the 3 deals go through, it would result in just 3 companies selling 59% of all the globe’s seeds, with Monsanto/Bayer control 30% of the total; and 64% of the world’s pesticides. There will be strong opposition in the US and around the globe. Regulators will likely demand the sale of some soybeans, cotton and canola seed assets as a condition for approving the deal, at the very least. And it is possible that all three deals will be shot down.

Vitae Pharmaceuticals shares more than doubled to $20.85 after Allergan said it would buy the company for $639 million.

U.S. import prices fell for the first time in six months in August on declining petroleum and food costs. The Labor Department says import prices decreased 0.2 percent in August after an unrevised 0.1 percent gain in July. Last month’s drop was the first since February. Import prices have been constrained by a strong dollar and cheap oil.

That, together with sluggish wage growth have left inflation persistently running below the Fed’s 2 percent target. Imported petroleum prices declined 2.8 percent last month after decreasing 3.6 percent in July. Import prices excluding petroleum were unchanged after climbing 0.5 percent in July. The report also showed export prices fell 0.8 percent in August.

You’ve heard that old line “we fought a War on Poverty, and poverty won.” Well, maybe poverty hasn’t won, but it is still too high. New data from the Census Bureau shows median middle-class wages rose 5.2% between 2014 and 2015, the first annual increase since 2007. But the median household income was still lower than it was in 2007.

The official poverty rate decreased to 13.5 percent for last year, a drop of 1.2 percentage points. That represents 3.5 million people who are no longer in poverty and is the largest annual percentage point drop since 1999. And the uninsured rate continued to fall. The percentage of Americans without health insurance for the entire year dropped by 1.3 percentage points, to 9.1 percent.

Since 2013, the uninsured rate is down 4.3 percentage points. Still, the Census Bureau reports that 11.2 million individuals were pushed below the poverty line last year because of medical expenses. The latest data found that 29 million people went uninsured last year, including 3.7 million children, and that deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs have continued to rise well after the Affordable Care Act (ACA) went into law in 2010. The quickest path to the poor house is to get sick.

Americans all grew richer pretty much across the board last year, but they also stayed relatively unequal. The Gini coefficient, which the Census uses to track the gap between the rich and poor, was unchanged in the last year, despite all those wage gains and declining poverty. In fact, it’s up 5.5% since 1993, when the government first began tracking the data.

Women might be earning more today, but the gap between what they earn and what men expect to earn hasn’t narrowed significantly since 2007. Despite the many positive trends in the report, there are also still lingering signs of an uneven recovery. To date, only one income group is actually earning any more than they were in 2007: the top 5%.

In his annual State of the Union speech, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker warned the EU was facing an “existential threat,” but insisted that Brexit doesn’t mean “the disintegration of the European Union.” He also said the U.K. could not expect access to the EU’s internal market without the free movement of people.

European officials will unveil new technology rules today aimed at reining in many of the world’s largest tech firms. Under the proposals, which will take years to complete, European publishers may be given powers to charge internet companies whenever their content shows up in online results or other services. Chat apps will also be more heavily policed by extending rules which currently only cover telecoms providers.

With plans to launch by the end of October, Facebook and Twitter have joined a network of over 30 companies to tackle fake news and improve the quality of reporting from social media. Google-backed First Draft Coalition will create a voluntary code of practice, promote news literacy among social media users, and establish a platform where members can verify questionable stories.

Walmart is working on a self-driving shopping cart that customers would be able to hail like an Uber – possibly through a smartphone app. Not only has the retailer filed a patent for a cart that has a motor and video cameras, but it would be able to return itself from customers’ cars to the store. The system may also help Walmart manage inventory by scanning store shelves to ensure products are there.

Ford Motor CEO Mark Fields says that all of the company’s small-car production would be leaving U.S. plants and heading to lower-cost Mexico. Ford also rolled out plans today to expand into robo-taxi fleets and other autonomous-car services. Ford says the move into new business services will deliver 20% profit margins once rolled out — far higher than the low single-digit return typical for car manufacturers. Ford told investors that its 2017 financial performance would decline from this year’s levels.

Uber launched its self-driving pilot program in Pittsburgh today; the unveiling of the company’s secretive work in autonomous vehicles and the first time self-driving cars have been so freely available to the U.S. public. But it is not as if robots are taking over the Steel City. There will be only four self-driving vehicles available to passengers, to start, and two people will sit in the front to take over driving when the car cannot steer itself.

Uber’s Pittsburgh fleet consists of Ford Fusion cars outfitted with 3D cameras, global positioning systems (GPS) and a technology called lidar that uses lasers to assess the shape and distance of objects, mounted somewhat crudely to the vehicle’s roof. The company is also outfitting Volvo SUVs that will be added to the fleet.

SpaceX hopes to start launching its rockets again in November, a mere three months after the company’s Falcon 9 exploded on a launch pad at Cape Canaveral. But given the significant repairs needed for Launch Complex 40 – the site of the explosion – SpaceX’s next flight will likely take off from the Vandenberg Air Force Base or an alternate launch site at the Kennedy Space Center.

The Hanjin Shipping Co. terminal at South Korea’s largest port used to be one of the world’s busiest. Dozens of container carriers would line up to ferry boxes to and from the giant cranes that loaded and unloaded the world’s biggest ships. Last week the terminal, as big as 100 football fields, came to a virtual standstill. Whatever capital is tied up in those containers isn’t moving, any more than the container are. Hanjin is not alone. Of the biggest 12 shipping companies that have published results for the past quarter, 11 have announced huge losses. Several weaker outfits are teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.

Apple’s stock hit a 2016 high today, with its market value peaking above $600 billion for the first time since April. Reports of strong early orders for the iPhone 7 as well as arch-rival Samsung Electronics’ widely-publicized recall of potentially exploding Galaxy Note 7 smartphones, pushed shares of Apple up 10 percent in the past three days.

JPMorgan is now the biggest bank in the world by market capitalization. Shares of Wells Fargo slid 3.3% on Tuesday, giving the company a market capitalization of $239.7 billion, compared with JPMorgan’s $242.8 billion. Federal prosecutors are investigating Wells Fargo in connection with the bank’s sales practices after it agreed to pay $185 million in fines for opening more than 2 million unauthorized accounts. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, the probe by U.S. Attorneys in New York and San Francisco is in its early stages and could lead to a criminal inquiry

Financial Review

A Tight Range

Sinclair Noe — May 21, 2015

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 13:16 — 6.1MB)

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DOW + 0.34 = 18,285
SPX + 4 = 2130.82
NAS + 19 = 5090
10 YR YLD – .07 = 2.18%
OIL + 1.71 = 60.69
GOLD – 3.00 = 1207.80
SILV + .05 = 17.23

The S&P 500 closed at a record high today.

We had a slew of economic data this morning. The leading economic index rose 0.7% in April, indicating the US economy is still expanding.

Initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased 10,000 to a seasonally adjusted 274,000 for the week ended May 16. Despite last week’s increase, claims remained below 300,000, a threshold associated with a strengthening labor market, for an 11th straight week. The four-week average for jobless claims decreased to 266,250, a 15-year low.

The National Association of Realtors reports sales of existing homes fell 3.3% in April to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5.04 million. April’s sales pace was up 6.1% from a year earlier. The median sales price of used homes hit $219,400 in April, up 8.9% from the year-earlier period.

The jobless claims and existing home sales are pretty important because they are strong indicators for second quarter growth. We know the Fed is watching the labor market. It would be very difficult for the Fed to hike rates if the labor market starts showing signs of weakness. The housing data is important because this is how low interest rates provide stimulus to the broader economy. Housing is a long-term investment that is very sensitive to interest rates. It would be difficult for the Fed to hike rates if the housing market is showing signs of weakness. And so today’s economic data on jobs and housing would indicate a more accommodative monetary policy from the Fed.

The Philadelphia Fed’s manufacturing index dropped to a reading of 6.7 in May, down from 7.5 in April.

The flash reading of the Markit manufacturing purchasing managers index fell to 53.8 in May from 54.1 in April. New orders growth dropped to the slowest pace since January 2014. Export sales have declined for two straight months, adding to evidence that the strong dollar has been holding down the economy.

We know the markets are following the Fed and waiting for some direction, but for now the markets have shown very little as far as direction. The Dow Industrials have been trading in a range, a very tight range since the start of the year; and if this trend holds till the end of the quarter, it would mark the narrowest first-half trading range in the history of the Dow.

The Senate voted 62-38 on a procedural bill that sets up a vote, likely tomorrow, on the “fast-track” trade negotiating authority to complete the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal. The TPP, which is near completion after more than five years of negotiations, would create a free trade zone covering 40 percent of the world economy. Trading partners have said they want to see fast-track enacted before finalizing the pact, a goal the administration has set for this year. Obama has campaigned aggressively for fast-track over objections from the left wing of the Democratic Party.

The bill must also pass the House of Representatives, where an even tougher fight is expected. Some conservatives oppose giving the White House more power, and many of Obama’s Democrats worry about the impact on jobs and the environment. Critics say the rules, currently part of the TPP, undermine governments’ ability to set domestic policy on issues such as health and the environment, although supporters argue they are essential to avoid discrimination against foreign investors.

An oil spill has caused California to declare a state of emergency. Houston-based Plains All American Pipeline has spilled as much as 105,000 gallons of crude oil on California’s coast. The spill has prompted California Gov. Jerry Brown to declare a state of emergency.

ISIS has captured the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra. The militant group seized the city in central Syria after a bloody battle with pro-government forces. The fall of Palmyra, which is home to 2,000-year-old Roman ruins, comes five days after ISIS captured Ramadi, a provincial capital in Iraq. Activists say that with the latest advance, the militant group controls more than half of Syria’s territory.

CVS Health Corp said it will buy pharmacy services provider Omnicare for $12.7 billion.  Omnicare delivers drugs and helps senior-living facilities manage residents’ medications. CVS is the nation’s second-largest pharmacy benefits manager, handling drug plans for health insurers and employers.  CVS said the deal will also help expand its presence in the rapidly growing specialty pharmacy business, which sells high-cost drugs to treat complex or rare conditions. Both CVS and Omnicare are big Part D players and there could be some scale benefits in negotiating with other payors.  According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of people aged between 55 and 64 having two or more chronic conditions that require medication grew 39 percent in the last decade.

Lumber Liquidators said Chief Executive Officer Robert Lynch unexpectedly resigned from his post. Company founder Thomas Sullivan is serving as CEO during the search for a permanent replacement. Lumber Liquidators is trying to win back customers after “60 Minutes” reported in March that it sold Chinese-produced laminate flooring with toxic levels of formaldehyde, a known carcinogen. While the company assured consumers its products are safe, sales have slid and the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission is probing the allegations. The surprise announcement today undermines all of the company’s denials; and although the resignation is not exact evidence, it raises the possibility that Lumber Liquidators knowingly poisoned customers with dangerous products. It also raises the possibility that regulators are close to taking action against the company.

What is going on in Hong Kong? With no immediate explanation, Goldin Financial and Goldin Properties, both controlled by billionaire Pan Sutong, plunged more than 60% in Hong Kong trading this morning. Before the rout, the two stocks surged more than 300% in 2015 for the biggest gains on the Hang Seng Composite Index. The tumble follows the mysterious 47% drop in 24 minutes by Hanergy Thin Film Power on Wednesday, which erased $19 billion in market value before trading was suspended.

Shopify has priced its IPO at $17, a mark above the e-commerce firm’s lifted range of $14 to $16. Shopify (Pending:SHOP) intends to list its shares on the Toronto and New York stock exchanges.

A U.S. bankruptcy judge has cleared the way for RadioShack to sell its trademark, as well as customer data and other intellectual property to a Standard General affiliate for about $26 million, rejecting a competing bidder’s claim that the auction process was unfair. RadioShack also resolved objections to the sale from several state attorneys general who were concerned the deal could threaten consumers’ privacy.

Radio Shack’s bankruptcy has left some creditors in the lurch. They owe thousand, in some cases, hundreds of thousands to a few hardware startups. For many hardware startups, or almost any kind of startup, it can be difficult to negotiate a strong contract for direct sales to large retailers, so many times the products are placed with the retailers in what is basically a consignment agreement. Radio Shack did pay one creditor, though; Apple received just north of $3.3 million. Obviously the Cupertino giant had a number of contractual clauses that required payment no matter what, a side-effect of having excellent lawyers. Other smaller players were paid portions of the money owed. Maybe they can convert to Shake Shacks.

Goldman Sachs has published its list of the stocks hedge funds like and a list of stocks they love to short. For a long time, Apple reigned “undisputed as the most popular hedge fund stock,” but a quick check of your Apple Watch will show you that times change. The most recent iteration of Goldman Sachs’ quarterly update on holdings of hedge funds shows that the drug company Actavis has taken over the top spot. Some 77 hedge funds reported having Actavis as one of their top 10 holdings. Apple is in second place, followed by Facebook, Valeant and Microsoft. The most shorted stocks by hedge funds are AT&T, Disney, IBM, Verizon, and Intel. You may recall that Apple replaced AT&T in the Dow Jones Industrial Average back in March, and since then, AT&T has gained about 6%, but for the funds it appears to be a case of guilt by lack of association.

The US Census has just released population stats for major cities. Ten US cities now have 1 million or more people; California and Texas each have three off those places. The big cities in Texas are Houston, San Antonio and Dallas. The big cities in California are Los Angeles, San Diego, and….San Jose, which just topped the one million population mark. Texas has been growing for a fairly simple reason – jobs, and many of those jobs are related to the oil industry. It remains to be seen whether the sharp decline in oil prices over the last year will jolt the growth train off the rails.

San Antonio had the fastest growth rate among US cities, up 7.7%. Phoenix has grown by 6% from 2010 through 2014. New York is the largest city in the country with 8.4 million; there are 3.9 million Angelinos; Phoenix comes in at the number 6 spot, and if current growth rates hold up, we should overtake Philadelphia for the number 5 spot sometime in late 2016.

FINANCIAL REVIEW

Good Luck With That

Sinclair Noe — January 29, 2015

Podcast: Play in new window | Download (Duration: 13:17 — 6.1MB)

DOW + 225 = 17,416
SPX + 19 = 2021
NAS + 45 = 4683
10 YR YLD + .02 = 1.75%
OIL + .09 = 44.54
GOLD – 25.20 = 1259.10
SILV – 1.04 = 17.02

Yesterday, the Federal Reserve said it would remain “patient” on raising rates, but indicated it saw the U.S. economy getting stronger. The Fed also said it has seen inflation decline, and it may decline further, but that low oil prices are probably temporary. The FOMC statement said that economic activity has expanded “at a solid pace” and that labor market conditions have improved.

That was certainly the case last week. The fewest Americans in almost 15 years filed applications for unemployment benefits during a holiday-shortened week that typically makes the data more volatile. Jobless claims dropped by 43,000 to 265,000 in the week ended Jan. 24, the lowest since April 2000. No state reported an increase of more than 1,000 in claims for the week ended Jan. 17.

The National Association of Realtors reports its index of pending home sales fell 3.7% in December, though the year-on-year gain was 11.7%, the highest since June 2013. Pending sales measures contracts signed but not yet closed.

The Census Bureau reports the number of owner-occupied households fell by 354,000 from a year earlier as the homeownership rate dropped to its lowest level since 1994. The ownership rate for people under age 35 fell to 35.3%, down 1.5 percentage points from a year earlier and the lowest level in Census data going back to 1982. The number of renter-occupied residences grew by 2 million last year. Vacancy rates for rentals fell to 7% in the fourth quarter, the lowest since 1993. Total households increased 1.66 million. This means that younger people are finally entering the housing market, even if it is as renters rather than owners. That’s good news for landlords, better news for parents.

Denmark’s central bank cut interest rates today to negative 0.5%. Denmark’s rates were already negative, now more so. Denmark operates a currency peg with the euro, which has come under increasing pressure as the single currency has weakened with the recently announce quantitative easing plan.

The German economy has slipped into deflation for the first time in more than five years, and may not see inflation again before the year is out. Prices dropped by 0.3% in the year to January. Eurostat is due to publish inflation figures for the euro area as a whole on Friday. Economists expect these will show prices have fallen faster still, at 0.5% in the year to January.

The Bloomberg Commodity index, which tracks the global prices of 22 different commodities such as gold and oil, dropped to the lowest level since August 2002. The strength of the US dollar has hit commodity prices hard. Because most commodities traded in international markets are quoted in US dollars. When the dollar rises they become more expensive and this hits demand. The US dollar index, which tracks the price of the US dollar against the world’s currencies, has increased by more than 18% within the past six months.

Oil is near a 6-year low as stockpiles surge. The Energy Information Administration reported record-high inventories in the U.S. and raised more anxieties about the global oil glut. Domestic crude inventories rose by almost 9M barrels last week to reach nearly 407M, the highest level since the government began keeping records in 1982.

At the same time that oil price has been declining, we’ve also observed big drops in the price of other commodities like copper, the yield on 10-year US Treasuries, and the value of other currencies relative to the dollar. Certainly part of the reason for the decline in oil is because global demand has dropped, even as supplies remain high, but that isn’t a full explanation for the other commodities dropping.

Markets have been volatile in January. The S&P 500 dropped 1.4 percent Wednesday, bringing its slide this month to 2.8 percent, the most since January 2014. The Chicago Board Options Exchange Volatility Index jumped 32 percent in the previous two days, its biggest gain in almost seven weeks. Earnings season is in high gear as 52 of the S&P 500 companies post results today. Of those that have reported profit so far, 76 percent have exceeded estimates, while 57 percent topped sales projections.

Google posted fourth quarter numbers after the close of trade. They missed on the top line and the bottom line. Revenue (minus traffic acquisition costs) was $14.4 billion versus $14.6 billion estimates. Adjusted EPS was $6.88 vs $7.08 expected. Google’s share of the online-ad market is coming under pressure as more users spend time on smartphones and tablets. The average price of ads fell 3% in the quarter, following a decline of 2 percent in the previous period.

Also after the close, Amazon reported fourth quarter profits. That’s right, a profit not a loss of $214 million, or 45 cents per share, beating estimates of 18 cents. Revenue came in at $29.3 billion, missing estimates of $29.6 billion. Amazon forecast first-quarter sales of $20.9 billion to $22.9 billion, falling short of analysts’ average projection of $23 billion.

Alibaba Group’s quarterly revenue fell short of analysts’ expectations, showing signs of a slowdown in the Chinese e-commerce company’s growth during the holiday shopping season. Revenue rose 40% to $4.2 billion in the December quarter, missing the average analyst estimate of $4.4 billion. But margins increased to 58% from 50% in the prior quarter.

ConocoPhillips, the largest independent oil and gas company, reported a quarterly loss and again slashed its 2015 capital expenditures, citing lower crude prices. ConocoPhillips said its fourth-quarter loss was $39 million or 3 cents per share; excluding one-time items related, ConocoPhillips had a profit of 60 cents. In December, ConocoPhillips announced plans to cut spending 20% including eliminating a $6.5 billion plant in Qatar; now they say they expect to spend $11.5 billion, down from a prior projection of $13.5 billion.

Royal Dutch Shell posted Q4 profit of $4.2 billion, compared with $2.2 billion for same quarter a year earlier, although it said it would lower capex in 2015 and curtail overall spending by a total of $15 billion over the next 3 years.

More than 30,000 job cuts have been announced across the oil industry as companies shrink budgets. Exploration and production spending is expected to fall by more than $116 billion, or 17%.

Qualcomm reduced its outlook for fiscal 2015, saying it expects its newest Snapdragon mobile chip to not be used in a “major customer’s” flagship smartphone. The company also blamed increased competition in China for the reduced guidance. Still showing surprising growth for its latest quarter, Qualcomm reported that first-quarter net income rose 5% from a year ago to $2 billion.

Nokia reported stronger-than-expected quarterly profits this morning lifted by robust sales of latest-generation wireless telecom equipment in North America. Net profit in the three months to end-December quarter was €443M. However, the company stuck to a forecast for weakening profitability.

Confirming the firm’s first annual earnings decline in three years, Samsung Electronics said that October-December profit fell 28% from a year earlier, as strong chip earnings failed to make up for weakness in its mobile division (its fifth consecutive quarter of decline). Samsung issued a statement saying: “Uncertainties for global business conditions will likely grow further in 2015 due to the slowing Eurozone economy and financial risks in emerging countries.”

Deutsche Bank, has a boatload of legal problems and even more investigations but they posted a surprise Q4 net profit today after cutting the reserves it set aside to cover upcoming legal action and on higher investment banking revenue. Net profit of €438M beat expectations of a €289M loss forecast by analysts.

One of those legal investigations involves rigging the $5.3 trillion-a-day foreign exchange markets. Deutsche Bank and 11 other major banks are under investigation. A judge in Manhattan says investors can proceed with their anti-trust lawsuit accusing the big banks of a long running manipulation of closing spot prices, also known as the Fix. According to the 2013 lawsuit, these banks have held an 84 percent global market share in currency trading, and were counterparties in 98 percent of U.S. spot volume. The lawsuit is separate from criminal and civil probes worldwide into whether banks rigged currency rates to boost profit at the expense of customers and investors.

If you go to a restaurant today, chances are the food came from either Sysco or US Foods. The approval for an $8.2 billion Sysco-US Foods deal is being delayed again after the FTC sent a subpoena to a third-party food distributor this week asking for more information. Antitrust concerns are focused on whether the Sysco deal will drive up costs, as the two are the only ones with geographic reach to offer nationwide contracts for a wide variety of goods.

The FCC voted today to classify broadband internet as connections that provide download speeds of at least 25 megabits per second (Mbps) and upload speeds of 3 Mbps. That’s a good move. Those speeds are a lot faster than many people probably get from their internet provider (ISP). By definition, ISPs won’t be able to say they provide broadband unless they can give you at least those speeds.

Tuesday, May 06, 2014 - Quickly Aging Here

Financial Review with Sinclair Noe

DOW – 129 = 16,401
SPX – 16 = 1867
NAS – 57 = 4080
10 YR YLD  - .02 = 2.59%
OIL + .38 = 99.86
GOLD – 1.80 = 1308.90
SILV - .04 = 19.65

There was a pretty broad selloff on Wall Street today. AIG posted lousy earnings late yesterday, and today they dragged down most of the financials. Twitter proved a drag on the tech stocks. Twitter reached the 6 month expiration of a lock-up period that had restricted sale of about 82% of its outstanding stock. Share prices dropped about 18% today, but home prices in Silicon Valley are likely to move a bit higher in the next month. After the close, Disney posted better than expected earnings.

Let’s start with economic data; the trade deficit narrowed in March, down 3.6% to $40.4 billion. March exports came in at about $193 billion and imports were around $234 billion, resulting in a $40 billion shortfall. Exports are 17% above the pre-recession peak, while imports are about 1% above the pre-recession peak. Exports of capital goods, industrial supplies and materials, and automobiles increased in March. Exports of services hit a record high, while those of non-petroleum goods were also the highest on record. Exports to Canada, South Korea and Germany all touched all-time highs in March. Imports of food and non-petroleum products hit record highs in March.

Last week we saw the estimate for first quarter gross domestic product showing 0.1% growth; that estimate worked with an assumption that the trade deficit for March would come in at $38.9 billion, not the $40.4 billion reported today. So, this implies that the GDP number could be re-estimated by two-tenths, which would mean a negative -0.1% GDP for the first quarter, or maybe just a bit worse. There will be other data considered in the final GDP number, but it now looks like a negative number. And most economists are calling for a bounce back in the second quarter.

Corelogic reports home prices nationwide, including distressed sales, increased 11.1% in March 2014 compared to March 2013. This change represents 25 months of consecutive year-over-year increases in home prices nationally. On a month-over-month basis, home prices nationwide, including distressed sales, increased 1.4% in March 2014 compared to February 2014.

Excluding distressed sales, home prices nationally increased 9.5% in March 2014 compared to March 2013 and 0.9% month over month compared to February 2014. So, home price increases are slowing, and this might also prove a drag on GDP, but it doesn’t necessarily mean the housing market is in the dumps. One of the bright points in the report is that there are fewer distressed sales, that means there is also less inventory, and there is less negative equity.

A separate report from Black Knight Financial, a mortgage research firm finds the number of mortgages on which lenders initiated foreclosure in March fell to the lowest level in more than 7 years. Banks initiated foreclosure on 88,000 properties in March, down more than 27% from a year ago, and well below the high of more than 316,000 in March 2009.

Foreclosures should continue to trend down because the share of mortgages that are behind on their payments is also declining. Around 2.1% of all loans were in some stage of foreclosure in March, the lowest level since late 2008, and another 5.5% of all borrowers were 30 days or more past due on their loans but not yet in foreclosure, the lowest since late 2007. Both of those are still well above pre-crisis levels but they are down sharply from a few years ago.

Growth in the services sector accelerated in April, rising at the fastest pace in eight months as new orders jumped and overall activity quickened by the most since early 2008. The ISM said its services sector index rose to 55.2 in April from 53.1 in March, topping expectations for a read of 54.1. The data provides further evidence that economic activity is regaining momentum after lagging through much of the winter.

Today is the anniversary of one of the scariest days in market history. On May 6, 2010, the Dow plunged nearly 1,000 points in a matter of minutes in what became known as the flash crash. The crash wiped out $1 trillion in wealth in the blink of an eye, only to recover, kinda, sorta. High-frequency computerized trading was believed to at least be part of the cause of the technical breakdown. And the regulators have not figured it out to this day, and yes it could happen again.  

Last week, SEC Chair Mary Jo White testified before Congress that the markets were not rigged. Today, the SEC announced they have sent out subpoenas demanding records from brokerage companies to try and figure out how customers’ orders are routed, and how firms are being paid for order flow. The good news is the SEC is investigating; the bad news is that dark pool and high frequency trading has been going on for years and the SEC appears totally clueless.

Institutional Investor released its Rich List, a list of the 25 top income generating hedge fund managers. David Tepper of Appaloosa Management topped the list with $3.5 billion in earnings. Second on the list was Steven Cohen of SAC Capital, who might have fared better if his firm hadn’t been guilty of insider trading. Just for reference, $3.5 billion works out to $400,000 an hour.

I also ran across an article that puts the Fed’s QE into perspective. The Federal Reserve has spent approximately $3.2 trillion in the post-Crisis era, with most of the money being dropped from helicopters hovering over Wall Street banks. The Fed mainly bought Treasuries and mortgage backed securities, but they could have mailed a check for $10,223 to every person in the US; they could have bought back all the US debt owned by China, Japan, and Belgium; they could have created 12.8 million jobs in 2009, each paying $50k a year, and still be making payroll for them today – which actually would have met their mandate. And that’s just based upon large scale asset purchases under QE; by some estimates the Fed has dished out my than $17 trillion to prop up the financial order. A trillion here, a trillion there, pretty soon it adds up to real money.

The Census Bureau released a report on the demographic makeup of the US; the population is aging rapidly; about 1 in 5 Americans (21%) will be 65 years old and up by 2050, compared with just 13% in 2010 and less than 10% in 1970. It sounds like a lot of old people, but it seems less so when compared with other countries. In 2050, around 40% of Japan’s population will be 65-plus, up from 24% in 2012. In Germany, Italy, Spain, and Poland over 30% will be 65 plus. China will have about 26% of its population over the age of 65, which amounts to more old people in China than the entire population of the US.

The concern with an aging population is that there will be a much slower economy: less spending, less saving, lower economic output, and slower growth; fewer working age people paying taxes, less money going into social programs like Social  Security and Medicare, and more money coming out of those programs. But the Census report also finds that the working age population will increase, mainly due to immigration.

The White House today released the 2014 National Climate Assessment, written by 300 climate experts and reviewed by the National Academy of Sciences. The full report, at more than 800 pages, is the most comprehensive look at the effects of climate change in the US to date. Don’t worry, they also provided a Cliff Notes version that weighs in at a mere 137 pages, thereby killing fewer trees. The short and sweet is that we’re all going to fry; it’s too late, climate change is here and now, and it will just get worse and worse.

Average temperatures in the US have increased 1.3 degrees to 1.9 degrees Fahrenheit (depending on the part of the country) since people began keeping records in 1895, and about 80% of that warming has come in the past 20 years. The period from 2001 to 2012 was warmer than any previous decade on record, across all regions of the country. And it will keep getting hotter. If we really get very serious about cutting emissions, temperatures will rise by 3 to 5 degrees, depending on location, over the next 80 years; if we keep going the way we’re going, temperatures will rise 5 to 10 degrees, and maybe by 15 degrees in some places. That means 115 degree days in the desert southwest could be 125 to 130 degrees.

In addition to extreme heat, you can add wildfires, and drought, and hurricanes, and extreme downpours – real gulley washers, plus rising sea levels. The report says that in much of the US, especially the Midwest and Northeast, more rain is falling in short-duration, heavy bursts, leading to more flooding. The Northeast and Midwest may continue to get wetter, while the Southwest becomes even more parched, raising water supply and energy concerns there.

The report warns the Southwest to prepare for major disruptions ahead due to climate change: "Increased heat and changes to rain and snowpack will send ripple effects throughout the region’s critical agriculture sector, affecting the lives and economies of 56 million people –- a population that is expected to increase 68% by 2050, to 94 million. Severe and sustained drought will stress water sources, already over-utilized in many areas, forcing increasing competition among farmers, energy producers, urban dwellers, and plant and animal life for the region’s most precious resource."

The report says the Southwest will be plagued by drought, which is not really uncommon, but the droughts will be hotter and drier and longer and will lead to a big increase in wildfire activity, which has already started to take place.

The report notes that American society and its infrastructure were built for the past climate, not the future. It highlights examples of the kinds of changes that state and local governments can make to become more resilient. One of the main takeaways is that you don't want to look at the weather records of yesteryear to determine how to set up your infrastructure.

Wednesday, March 26, 2014 - Render to Caesar

by Sinclair Noe

Financial Review

DOW – 98 = 16,268
SPX – 13 = 1852
NAS – 60 = 4173
10 YR YLD - .03 = 2.70%
OIL + 1.03 = 100.22
GOLD – 5.90 = 1306.80
SILV - .27 = 19.84

Durable goods orders increased 2.2% in February, ending 2 straight months of declines. Durable goods are items like refrigerators, cars, and airplanes that are built to last for several years. But we need to dig into this report just a little; orders for non-defense goods, excluding aircraft, were actually down 1.3%. This might also indicate that first quarter business investment is weak.

The US Census Bureau began releasing data from its 2012 Economic Census, a survey of American businesses taken every 5 years. The enormous boom in domestic oil and gas production helped make the mining, quarrying and oil and gas extraction industry one of the fastest growing sectors of the US economy. The number of businesses rose 26% from 2007 to 2012, employment in the sector rose 24% and revenue surged 34%. Meanwhile, from 2007 to 2012 manufacturing lost 2.1 million jobs, now down to just 11.3 million people employed in manufacturing.

The finance and insurance sector shed 390,000 jobs between 2007 and 2012 and industry revenue fell by $137 billion, nearly 4%. But revenues in 2012 were still up 61% from 15 years earlier. There were one million retail stores operating in 2012. But the retail trade sector shed 65,000 establishments and nearly 778,000 jobs from five years earlier. Internet-based selling was something of a bright spot, with the number of “nonstore retailers” rising 12%, though employment was basically flat. The health care and social assistance sector is the nation’s largest employer, with 18.6 million workers in 2012. That’s up 11% from five years earlier, and revenue for the industry rose 23% to just over $2 trillion.

President Obama said after a summit with top EU officials that Russian President Vladimir Putin had miscalculated if he thought he could divide the West or count on its indifference over his annexation of Crimea. The United States and the European Union agreed to work together to prepare possible tougher economic sanctions in response to Russia's behavior in Ukraine. The sanctions could possibly include the energy sector.

Yesterday, the Supreme Court went back to revisit the Affordable Care Act, hearing the consolidated arguments in Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby and Conestoga Wood Specialties Corp, in which the owners of the for-profit businesses Hobby Lobby and Conestoga claim they should be allowed to deny their employees health insurance coverage for certain types of birth control based on the owners' personal religious beliefs.

 In enacting the ACA, Congress required large employers to provide basic preventive care for employees. That turned out to include all 20 contraceptive methods approved by the Food and Drug Administration. Under the law, religious nonprofits were exempted from this requirement, but for-profit corporations were not. Hobby Lobby's attorneys argue that the law violates the company's constitutional right to religious freedom by forcing it to cover all forms of birth control or pay steep fines.

This is a very interesting case on several levels. The Supreme Court, in business cases, has held that "incorporation's basic purpose is to create a legally distinct entity, with legal rights, obligations, powers, and privileges different from those of the natural individuals who created it, who own it, or whom it employs." In recent constitutional law cases, however, the justices seem to have forgotten this basic principle of corporate law. In Citizens United, the court effectively held that corporations enjoyed the same free speech rights as ordinary individuals.

Now, in the Hobby Lobby case, the owners of the craft store chain want the court to again forget about the basic principles of corporate law and decide that corporate personhood extends beyond free speech to religious freedoms. It seems a bit of a stretch. Hobby Lobby’s owners certainly have constitutionally protected religious rights, but Hobby Lobby's owners aren't required by the law to do anything. The legal duty falls on Hobby Lobby, the company, not its owners. If Hobby Lobby fails to provide the required insurance, the company, not the owners, is responsible.

The Hobby Lobby case would require the Supremes to "pierce the corporate veil"; legalese for looking behind the corporation's legal identity and basing a ruling on the interests and desires of the owners of the firm, but Hobby Lobby's owners only want to pierce the veil for this one issue, birth control, while maintaining the protections of the corporate form for everything else, including limited liability. The whole point of corporations being “people” is that they are distinct from their owners, officers, and employees.

Hobby Lobby should only have the rights of legal personhood that are essential for its operations. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall wrote nearly 200 years ago, "Being the mere creature of law," the corporation "possesses only those properties which the charter of its creation confers upon it either expressly or as incidental to its very existence." In Citizens United, the Supreme Court said this includes some limited speech rights, as we ordinarily expect firms to advertise and communicate with employees and customers.

Not everyone, or even a majority, agree with the Citizens United ruling. A February 2010 ABC News-Washington Post poll found 80% of Americans opposed Citizens United and 72% support the idea of a legislative workaround to reinstate the limits the court lifted. And expanding corporate personhood to religious liberty, well that’s even more of a stretch.

Until 1990, the court applied a tough test to examine laws that disadvantaged people's religious beliefs. Then, the justices changed direction in a case involving penalties for the use of peyote as part of a Native American religious ceremony, the court ruled that as long as a law that applies generally to all citizens is neutrally applied, it is constitutional, even though it may have some unhappy consequences for some believers. 

Congress didn’t like the decision, and in 1993 passed the Religious Freedom Restoration Act. Under the act, if a law imposes a substantial burden on the free exercise of religion, it has to meet a high threshold for justification. Hobby Lobby claims the religious practice of the corporation now faces a substantial burden. And if there is a burden, can the government justify it with a “compelling state interest” and the “least restrictive means” of reaching it.

The case raises some interesting philosophical arguments that began with the liberal justices peppering Hobby Lobby’s lawyers with slippery-slope hypotheticals.  If Hobby Lobby can deny coverage for contraception, why couldn’t a Christian-Scientist-owned company deny health insurance completely?  What if a Muslim-owned company wanted to make employees were burqas on the job? What then?

 “How does a corporation exercise religion?” that was a question posed by Justice Sotomayor yesterday.

Justice Anthony Kennedy, who many expect to be the swing vote in this case, questioned both sides aggressively. Kennedy asked why the company couldn't just choose not to provide health insurance at all, pay a tax and then raise salaries to allow employees to purchase health care on their own. Assuming that would be a financial "wash," Kennedy asked, "Then what would your case be?"

And that may very well be the key question of the day, for two reasons. First, is it a “substantial burden’ for a company to not offer health insurance to its employees? For Hobby Lobby they are looking at about $26 million in taxes, but that is cheaper than the cost of the insurance; a bigger burden is the loss of competitive advantage. Justice Kagan, in particular, effectively said “so what?”  But is that really true? Is it really a trivial thing to not offer a desired benefit to employees?  I guess we’ll see in June. The second reason is that the individual mandate is a tax.

Let’s take the way-back machine to the summer of 2012. And we land on the steps of the Supreme Court in Washington DC. Chief Justice John Roberts has just issued a decision in the case of National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius. Surprisingly, Roberts sided with the 4 liberal justices to determine that the Affordable Care Act is constitutional and that the individual mandate is not valid as an exercise of Congress’ commerce clause power but the majority upholds the mandate as a tax. 

Chief Justice Roberts wrote in the controlling opinion: "The individual mandate cannot be upheld as an exercise of Congress's power under the Commerce Clause. That Clause authorizes Congress to regulate interstate commerce, not to order individuals to engage in it. In this case, however, it is reasonable to construe what Congress has done as increasing taxes on those who have a certain amount of income, but choose to go without health insurance. Such legislation is within Congress's power to tax."

Obamacare, or the Affordable Care Act, relies upon the individual mandate, which basically says you get insurance or pay a penalty, and that mandate is a tax. We all have to pay taxes, individuals and corporations alike. There are many ways the government spends tax dollars that I don’t like; you probably feel the same way; someone might even have religious objections to the way the government spends tax dollars. But we all have to pay taxes; that decision was handed down a long time ago: “Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s and to God the things that are God’s.” And we’ll see if the Supreme Court can recognize the difference.