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This is the latest in a series of forecast posts I have covered.  Notably, there has been Richard Bernstein, Saxo Bank and Byron Wien. The Pragmatic Capitalist has The Ultimate Guide to 2010 Investment Predictions and Outlooks, if you are interested in more. In this post, I especially like his narratives on behavioral psychology, one [...]

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Markets were disappointed by today’s unemployment data because they reveal how difficult it has been for the employment situation to improve in a meaningful way. The employment market is improving, just not as much as one would hope. Below are four charts derived from the household survey data that tell the story, but also point [...]

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The forecast was for 10.1% unemployment and a gain of +15,000 jobs according to Market Watch, but 10.0% unemployment and a flat non-farm payroll number according to Bloomberg. As a reminder, ADP reported the private sector shed 84,000 jobs, the smallest job loss since March 2008. So, the labor market is definitely improving.
But, in [...]

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Unadjusted jobless claims after the holiday season are always monstrous because of seasonality. Last week 645,571 people filed initial claims for unemployment insurance in the United States.  That is down from the 731,958 who filed at this time last year. Looking at the seasonally adjusted numbers, claims rose from to 434,000 last week from 433,000 [...]

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Initial jobless claims of 432,000 for the week ended 26 Dec 2009 were the lowest since July 2008. The 4-week average is now 460,250, the lowest since September 2008. If you look at the following two graphs, you can see that initial claims are plummeting.

The second chart shows that the change in initial [...]

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From this past week’s Unemployment Insurance Weekly Claims Report released today:
In the week ending Dec. 19, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 452,000, a decrease of 28,000 from the previous week’s unrevised figure of 480,000. The 4-week moving average was 465,250, a decrease of 2,750 from the previous week’s revised average of [...]

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So, it’s that time of year again when people make their year-end predictions. I’ll be running my own and critiquing my performance from last year.  Here are former bear now bull Richard Bernstein’s ten predictions for 2010.  There is a clip at the bottom from CNBC as well.
Before you pillory Bernstein for going from David [...]

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The latest WSJ/NBC News poll shows that President Obama’s approval rating has now slipped under 50%. This makes his the steepest first year decline in modern history.
Why?  You know what I would say:

Obama doesn’t know when to be an asshole
Obama wasted political capital on bank bailouts

See what Aaron Task and Henry Blodget have [...]

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Initial jobless claims for the week ended December 12th came in at a seasonally-adjusted (SA) 480,000, which is a rise of 7,000 from the previous week.  This brings the 4-week SA average down to 467,500, the lowest in 15-months.  Clearly layoffs have receded.  However, hiring has yet to begin in earnest, so the employment situation [...]

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Below is the latest from John Mauldin via his weekly newsletter. John expects a double dip recession as I do. Here he talks about what I call structurally high private sector unemployment i.e. unemployment in the private sector that cannot be diminished in the medium-term without some serious government action.  As usual, I stress the [...]