The Stock Market Veers Further From Economic Reality Each Day

Jon Economy, Fiscal Policies, Market Commentary, Real Estate

Actual Monthly Change in August Payrolls Likely Was a Contraction – Though Bloated by Seasonal-Factor Distortions and Add-Factors, Annual Payroll Growth Effectively Held at a 30-Month Low – Second-Quarter Real Merchandise Trade Deficit Remained Worst Since 2007. – John Williams, Shadowstats.com
The negative economic news continues to spill out, with most economic reports reflecting an economy that is already in contraction (recession). The most interesting report out last week was auto sales for July, which showed a 5.5% drop from June overall and a 6.2% drop for domestic vehicles. These comps are based on seasonally ‘adjusted’ annualized rates. I would bet anything that the actual number of cars sold in July vs. June were a lot lower. Ford reported an 8.4% drop in sales. Ford admitted that the market was soft and that retail price incentives are at historical highs. In short, the overall auto sales report was a disaster and it’s going to get worse going forward.
With regard to the transports index, a report out on August 19th that received no attention in the financial media showed that Class 8 (heavy duty) truck orders fell 20% from June and 58% year over year. This is after hitting a four-year low in June. The big drop was blamed on a high rate of cancellations. This is consistent with regional Fed manufacturing reports out last week that showed big drops in new orders. Again, the economy is starting contract – in some areas rather quickly.
One last datapoint that you might not have seen because it was not reported in the mainstream financial media, or even Zerohedge: the delinquency rate for CMBS – commercial mortgage-backed securities – rose for the the 5th month in a row in July. The rise was attributed to ‘another slew of balloon defaults.’ Balloon defaults occur when the mortgagee is unable to make payments on mortgages that are designed with low up-front payments that reset to higher payments at a certain point in the life of the mortgage. This reflects an increasing inability of tenants in office, retail and multi-family real estate to make their monthly payments.

This post was published at Investment Research Dynamics By Dave Kranzler/ Sept 6, 2016.