Archive for November, 2007
« Previous Entries Next Entries »eBay’s Culture of Analytics: We All Need to Get on Board
Submitted by Businomics Blog
Fast Company’s latest article about eBay describes how the new chief technology officer created a “culture of analytics.” The old approach had been to set up a new feature or interface and see if it works. If not, roll it back, returning to the old way.
The new approach was started [...]
A note from a careful observer of US financial conditions
Submitted by unsettling economics
569: “I fancy that the great New York (banking) institutions have more skeletons in their cupboards than anyone yet knows about for certain, and that their concealed anxieties cramp their action more than is admitted.”
Keynes. 1930. “A Note on Economic Conditions in the United States: A Memorandum for the Economic Advisory Council.” [...]
Relief on oil supplies
Submitted by Econbrowser
We’re finally starting to see signs of gains in global oil production.
As Econbrowser readers are well aware, the big story on world oil markets over the last year has been Saudi Arabia, whose production in August was a million barrels a day below the level seen in 2005. On September 12 I wrote:
I [...]
Budget Deficit Watch: Receipts Stabilize, Deficit Fails to Shrink
Submitted by Econbrowser
Reader CoRev, in commenting on this post, advises me to look at the actual data for October (instead of the CBO estimate) before declaring a trend deterioration in the budget balance. Well, the data are out.
Here’s what the deficit looks like, using Treasury’s Monthly Treasury Statement data for October, and historical data.
Figure 1: [...]
THE RETURN OF THE BOND GHOULS
Submitted by The Capital Spectator
Some may doubt that a recession’s coming, but the bond market has already made up its mind.
The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury sunk to 3.85% yesterday, the lowest in three years. The rush to buy bonds, and thereby lower yields, reflects the growing sentiment that more trouble awaits the American [...]
A RECESSION FORECAST IS STILL A FORECAST
Submitted by The Capital Spectator
We’re told that a recession is coming, or something that looks and feels like a recession. In fact, we’re told a lot of things. Some of the predictions actually pan out; most just fade into oblivion. Alas, distinguishing one from the other is always a problem, and at times like this [...]
Forcing The Poor To Buy Rich Man’s Toys
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Closing sweatshops and forcing Western labor and environmental standards down poor people’s throats in the third world does nothing to elevate them out of poverty. Instead, it forces poor people to buy a lot of rich man’s toys, like clean air, clean water, and leisure time. If clean air and leisure time [...]
Barefoot Indian Steelworkers: “Help” Is On The Way
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
I was reminded of this cartoon while reading some of the comments on the Indian-made manhole covers in NYC.
Let me suggest an alternative caption:
“Help is on the way, barefoot Indian steelworkers. We’re cancelling all orders for Indian manhole covers in the U.S., and we’re also going to help shut down [...]
Carpe Diem On CNBC’s “Kudlow and Company”
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Thanks to Larry Kudlow for mentioning the Carpe Diem blog last night on CNBC’s “Kudlow and Company,” as well as featuring some Carpe Diem posts on his blog yesterday: “Perry Is On the Mark.” Three Carpe Diem graphs were featured last night on the show: the two from this CD post, and [...]
Moving In And Out of Those Income Brackets
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Significant Income Mobility: Quintiles Not Closed Clubs
Great column today by Thomas Sowell on That “Top One Percent,” here are a couple excerpts:
Americans in the top 1%, like Americans in most income brackets, are not there permanently, despite being talked about and written about as if they are an enduring “class” — especially [...]
Apostrophe Misuse Ending at The NY Times?
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
NYTimes today: In the first half of the 1990’s, she was Mr. Mitterrand’s lead aide on international trade issues.
NYTimes today: For two years in the mid-1990s, Mr. Morrissey was suspended from practicing law in New York State for mishandling a client’s escrow account.
NYTimes today: As prime minister in the 1990s, Nawaz [...]
New York Manhole Covers, Forged Barefoot in India
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
It’s not just call centers that are outsourced to India.
NEW DELHI — Eight thousand miles from Manhattan, barefoot, shirtless, whip-thin men rippled with muscle were forging prosaic pieces of the urban jigsaw puzzle: manhole covers.
Manhole covers manufactured in India can be anywhere from 20 to 60 percent cheaper than those made in [...]
Mad Money = Money-Losing Investment Advice
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
In the December 2007 issue of the Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, there is an article “Does Mad Money make the market go mad?”
From the abstract: Our analysis of returns and trading volume around stock recommendations aired on charismatic host Jim Cramer’s Mad Money program reveals statistical evidence of response to [...]
Commercial Bank Lending at All-Time High
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
From today’s front page WSJ article “Recession Fears Weigh Heavily On the Markets”:
This time around, much depends on how tight a rein financial institutions keep on their lending and consumers keep on their spending.
By itself, the housing slump seems unlikely to choke off U.S. economic growth. Home construction accounts for less [...]
Thoughts on the economic outlook of early 2008
Written by Michael Vass
Well now that everyone has finished the turkey (minus a few leftover sandwiches), let it digest, and worked off the extra weight running around shopping at every store with a discount sale it’s time of me to get back to work. There has been a lot worth writing about, but let me [...]
Three Cheers for Ingenuity
Submitted by unsettling economics
“Dr Nguyen Phuoc Huy said his hospital could never afford to buy one as the endoscope costs around $30,000. Instead he spent two years developing a DIY endoscope to peer inside the bodies of patients without the need for surgery.”
“The adaptor costs almost nothing because it is simply a system of [...]
Budget Deficit Watch: Receipts Stabilize, Deficit Fails to Shrink
Submitted by Econbrowser
Reader CoRev, in commenting on this post, advises me to look at the actual data for October (instead of the CBO estimate) before declaring a trend deterioration in the budget balance. Well, the data are out.
Here’s what the deficit looks like, using Treasury’s Monthly Treasury Statement data for October, and historical data.
Figure 1: [...]
In Euros and UK Pounds, Oil Prices Aren’t That Bad
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Rising oil prices, measured in dollars, get all of the media attention, largely because oil is priced and sold in dollars in world oil markets. What has gotten much less attention is the price of oil in other currencies like British pounds and Euros, which have both appreciated vs. the USD by [...]
You Can’t Trust Those Big-Government Socialists
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
NY Times: Transparency International, an organization that tracks corruption, ranks countries from least to most corrupt, and in its 2007 index Venezuela was at 162 out of 179 countries.
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Some Historical Perspective on Commercial Banks
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
The charts above are based on Federal Reserve commercial banking data released on Monday and available here, with updated data on a) loan charge-off rates and b) loan delinquency rates through the third quarter 2007 for all U.S. commercial banks.
As the charts show, despite all of the recent bad news and “gloom [...]
Ethanol: “Dangerous, Delusional Bullshit”
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
Ethanol: Fails a Cost-Benefit Test
Ethanol production in the United States has been steadily growing and is expected to continue growing. Many politicians see increased ethanol use as a way to promote environmental goals, such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and energy security goals. This paper provides the first thorough benefit-cost analysis of [...]
Goldilocks Rocks on Black Friday, +8.3% Increase
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
NEW YORK (AP) — The nation’s retailers had a robust start to the holiday shopping season, according to results announced today by a national research group that tracks sales at retail outlets across the country. According to ShopperTrak RCT, which tracks sales at more than 50,000 retail outlets, total sales rose 8.3% [...]
Oil and the dollar
Submitted by Econbrowser
The dollar falls and oil prices go up. So the two must be related, right?
Stephen Gordon has updated his graph of the price of oil measured in four separate currencies, noting that the price for oil-exporting Canada has gone up even more this month than for the oil-importing United States. Blaming the rising [...]
Why The Goldilocks Economy Can Handle $3 Gas
Submitted by CARPE DIEM
In a previous CD post “The Energy-Efficient Economy Can Handle $100 Oil,” I suggested that today’s economy is much better able to absorb higher energy prices than at any other time in the past, due to significant improvements in energy efficiency of the last 50 years. Compared to the early 1970s, the [...]
Evaluating a Complete Cycle
Submitted by A Dash of Insight
Jeff sent this post in from the road.
~Renae
Market timing can help investor returns. The method used should reflect the investments time frame, trading costs, and risk tolerance.
For investors with a long time horizon, we use market valuation models like the Fed Model to help us with asset allocation. [...]
