Running on Empty

Running on Empty

  The clock is ticking for the U.S. government’s finances. As our featured chart above shows, Uncle Sam’s checking account—something known as the Treasury General Account—is quickly shrinking. This week’s latest update showed the balance dropping to less than $50...
Great Expectations

Great Expectations

  For this week’s indicator, we’re going to take a look at stock market earnings and how they can be used to forecast stock market returns. In the top part of the chart above, we have plotted the S&P 500 Index’s monthly close (green line), which we’ll be...
Yearly Momentum

Yearly Momentum

OVERVIEW   The three major U.S. stock indices ended the week on a positive note, with both the Nasdaq and S&P 500 achieving their highest weekly close since August 2022. The Dow experienced a modest increase of 0.38%, while the S&P 500 saw a rise of 1.65%...
Sluggish

Sluggish

Sluggish growth continues to plague the U.S. economy. Retail sales and industrial production, both of which are strongly correlated with economic growth, came in unusually weak last month. The year-over-year change in retail sales, shown below, rose just 0.5% in...
Getting Liquid

Getting Liquid

  There’s this amusing scene in the 2000 movie Boiler Room where Ben Affleck’s character boasts about his wealth to a room full of interns. He proudly mentions his luxurious car, beautiful house, and most importantly, he says, “I am liquid.” By...