Black Friday was a black and blue Friday as US stock markets saw their sharpest declines since April 2020.
The selloff was spurred by a new COVID variant and fear of new lockdowns. The markets recovered on Monday, but the sudden stock dip was telling.
So, did you hit the Black Friday sales Friday morning?
That’s an emphatic “No!” for me. You’d have to just about give away stuff for free to lure me out on Black Friday. No thanks. Too peoplely!
When I was a kid, we used to say some things only “sound good on paper.” In other words, they seem like good plans, but there is no way they’re going to work in the real world.
That’s socialism in a nutshell.
The Pilgrims found this out the hard way during their first couple of years in North America.
President Joe Biden has tapped Jerome Powell to serve a second term as chairman of the Federal Reserve.
Biden said Powell’s “steady leadership” helped calm markets as governments shut down the economy due to coronavirus, and he expressed confidence in Powell’s future leadership. “I believe Jay is the right person to see us through,” Biden said.
Retail sales surged at a higher than expected rate in October, rising 1.7%.
The mainstream reported this as fantastic news signaling a strong economy. American consumers are out there buying lots of stuff. The stock market rallied and gold fell.
But the mainstream narrative isn’t giving you the full picture.
A story I ran across a couple of weeks ago provides an opportunity to make fun of all kinds of people, from a silver thief, to a silver buyer, to a really bad writer who somehow managed to land a job writing web stories for a local TV station.
The consumer price index was expected to come in hot yet again in October. It came in sizzling.
The actual CPI numbers for last month were even hotter than expected as “transitory” inflation remained well above 5% on an annual basis for the sixth straight month.
As governments shut down the economy in response to COVID-19 and the Federal Reserve put money printing into hyperdrive, we warned that it was a recipe for stagflation. Today, it looks like stagnation is here.
Stagflation is an economic environment with rapidly rising prices, a weak labor market, and low GDP growth. It’s looking more and more like we have all three elements.
Government policies – from shutdowns, to stimulus, to vaccine mandates – in response to the coronavirus pandemic have thrown the US economy completely out of whack. Looking at employment reveals just how messed up the economy has become.
The number of Americans quitting their jobs surged to a record high in August. According to the Labor Department Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) report, job quits increased by 242,000 in August, pushing the total to a record 4.3 million. The quits rate surged to an all-time high of 2.9% in August from 2.7% in July.
Have you heard the latest news on the fake debt-ceiling fight?
The Senate has approved a measure to kick the can down the road a couple of months. So, the “fight” will continue!
The $480 billion increase raises the debt limit to $28.9 trillion, but that’s only going to last until Dec. 3. That means we have time for more political theater. Yippee!
