Q4 2012 real GDP contracted by -0.1%. Inventory investment nose dived, but was not the lone culprit for economic contraction. Exports plunged and took -0.81 real GDP percentage points along with it. Government spending cliff dove and hacked off -1.33 percentage points from 4th quarter gross domestic product as Federal Defense spending declined 22.2% from Q3.
ADP's proprietary private payrolls jobs report shows a gained of 192,000 private sector jobs for January 2013. ADP December's reported 215,000 job gains were significantly revised downward by 30,000 to 185 thousand. Graphed below are the reported private sector jobs from ADP. This report does not include government, or public jobs.
The November 2012 S&P Case Shiller home price index shows a 5.5% price increase from a year ago for over 20 metropolitan housing markets and a 4.5% change for the top 10 housing markets from November 2011.
Pending Home Sales declined in December by -4.3%, annualized, according to the National Association of Realtors. Pending home sales have increased 6.9% from a year ago. November's pending home sales was revised down to 1.6% monthly increase.
The Fed is throwing every dollar it can at the economy, but instead of getting economic growth, it is creating asset bubbles. There is a mini-housing bubble, a student loan bubble, a government debt bubble, a sub-prime auto loan bubble, a farmland bubble, and a massive stock market bubble. What happens when the Fed takes its foot off the monetary pedal, as it must at some point?
Anonymous hacked into the U.S. Sentencing Commission website due to the suicide of Aaron Swartz. Swartz was facing 50 years in prison for downloading four million Academic Journal articles.
This week's featured documentary is Frontline's The Untouchables. Frontline asks the fundamental question, why hasn't anyone responsible for the financial crisis gone to jail?
December New Residential Single Family Home Sales decreased by -7.3%, or 369,000 annualized sales. The decline wipes out November's revised 9.3% increase. As we've repeatedly cautioned, beware of this report for most months the change in sales is inside the statistical margin of error and will be revised.
The concept of Davos is fantastic. Party at taxpayer expense, drink, surround yourself with sycophants of all ranks (including CNBS), and plot the demise of the average citizen in countries across the globe at a supranational level. And if anyone dares state the obvious that people really should listen to their own citizens and shareholders and taxpayers and not plan the demise of those very same groups while partying with people that don't have any allegiance to us, such "troublemakers" are labeled "conspiracy nuts."
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