Tag Archive: gasoline

Euro Pokes Above $1.09. Will it be Sustained?

2023-01-23

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2023-01-23

Overview: The Lunar New Year holiday has shut many centers in Asia until the middle of the week, though China's mainland is on holiday all week. The signaling of a downshift in the pace of Fed tightening by some notable hawks helped lift risk appetites ahead of the weekend and saw the S&P 500 snap a four-day decline.

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Prices As Curative Punishment

2022-06-14

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2022-06-14

It wasn’t exactly a secret, though the raw data doesn’t ever tell you why something might’ve changed in it. According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, confirmed by industry sources, US new car sales absolutely tanked in May 2022.

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Is It Being Demanded?

2022-05-29

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2022-05-29

Shipping container rates have been dropping since early March – right around the time when we had just experienced our “collateral days” and then stood by to witness chaotic financial fireworks, inversions, the whole thing.

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Shipping Around Retail ‘Inflation’

2022-05-22

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2022-05-22

This whole “inflation” scenario isn’t really that difficult to piece together, effect from cause. Sure, Jay Powell’s trying to nuke it by hiking the federal funds rate, but no one really uses fed funds and the problem isn’t the unsecured cost of borrowing bank reserves (not money) that are literally overflowing.

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Crude Contradictions Therefore Uncertainty And Big Volatility

2022-05-18

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2022-05-18

This one took some real, well, talent. It was late morning on April 11, the crude oil market was in some distress. The price was falling faster, already down sharply over just the preceding two weeks. Going from $115 per barrel to suddenly less than $95, there was some real fear there.But what really caught my attention was the flattening WTI futures curve.

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Not Good Goods

2022-04-24

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2022-04-24

The goods economy in the United States is – maybe was – the lone economic bright spot. That in and of itself should’ve provoked more caution, instead there was the red-hot recovery to sell under the cover of supply shock pricing changes. The sheer spending on goods, and how they arrived, each unabashedly artificial from the get-go.

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Perfect Time To Review What Is, And What Is Not, Inflation (and why it matters so much)

2021-10-13

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2021-10-13

It is costing more to live and be, so naturally people are looking for who it is they need to blame. Maybe figure out some way to stop it. You know and feel for the basics since everyone’s perceptions begin with costs of just living. This is what makes the subject of inflation so difficult, even more so in the era of QE.

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Downturn Rising, No ‘Glitch’ In Retail Sales

2019-03-13

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2019-03-13

U.S. Retail Sales, Jun 2011 - Dec 2018
You just don’t see $4 billion monthly retail sales revisions, in either direction. Advance estimates are changed all the time, each monthly figure will be recalculated twice after its initial release. Typically, though, the subsequent revisions are minor rarely amounting to a billion. Four times that?

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Now Back To Our Regularly Scheduled Economy

2018-10-17

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2018-10-17

Retail Sales, Gasoline 2011-2018
The clock really was ticking on this so-called economic boom. A product in many economic accounts of Keynesian-type fantasy, the destructive effects of last year’s hurricanes in sharp contrast to this year’s (which haven’t yet registered a direct hit on a major metropolitan area or areas, as was the case with Harvey and Irma) meant both a temporary rebound birthed by rebuilding as well as an expiration date for those efforts.

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What’s Hot Isn’t Retail Sales Growth

2018-08-18

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2018-08-18

US Retail Sales, June 2011 - 2018
Americans are spending more on filling up. A lot more. According the Census Bureau, retail sales at gasoline stations had increased by nearly 20% year-over-year (unadjusted) in both May and June 2018. In the latest figures for July, released today, gasoline station sales were up by more than 21%.

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Retail Sales Conundrum

2017-07-20

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2017-07-20

U.S. Retail Sales All Weakness, Jun 2011 - 2017
Retail sales were thoroughly disappointing in June. Whereas other accounts such as imports or durable goods had at least delivered a split decision between adjusted and unadjusted versions, for retail sales both views of them were ugly. Seasonally-adjusted first, spending last month was down for the second straight time. Worse than that, estimated sales were just barely more than in January.

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All About Inventory

2017-06-14

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2017-06-14

Crude Oil Stocks, January 2009 - June 2017
Andy Hall has been called the God of Oil. As chief of Astenbeck Capital, he has proven at times that even gods can be mortal. In the “rising dollar” period, for example, after making money on the way down Mr. Hall went bullish.

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Great Graphic: Gas and Oil

2017-05-06

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2017-05-06

Steep falls in gasoline and oil prices. Large build in gasoline inventories and record refinery work shifted some surplus from oil to the products. OPEC is expected to roll over its output cuts, but non-OPEC may find it difficult and US output continues to rise.

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Economics Through The Economics of Oil

2017-03-23

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2017-03-23

The last time oil inventory grew at anywhere close to this pace was during each of the last two selloffs, the first in late 2014/early 2015 and the second following about a year after. Those events were relatively easy to explain in terms of both price and fundamentals, though the mainstream managed to screw it up anyway (“supply glut”).

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Retail Sales: Extra Day Likely, no Meaningful Difference

2017-03-19

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2017-03-19

Retail Sales, Jan 1993 - 2017
Retail sales comparisons were for February 2017 skewed by the extra day in February 2016. With the leap year February 29th a part of the base effect, the estimated growth rates (NSA) for this February are to some degree better than they appear. Seasonally-adjusted retail sales were in the latest estimates essentially flat when compared to the prior month (January). That leaves too much guesswork to draw any hard conclusions.

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