Friday, July 17, 2015

Note: this is not an investment site.

Bloomberg is reporting:

New-home construction in the U.S. climbed in June to the second-highest level since November 2007 as builders stepped up work on apartment projects.

Of course, Bloomberg is the same group of folks who blame the US high school male dropouts on fracking. I can't make this stuff up. By the way, I was curious. Google "fracking high school dropouts" and you will see what I mean.

But I digress:

Housing starts rose 9.8 percent to a 1.17 million annualized rate from a revised 1.07 million in May that was stronger than previously estimated. The median estimate of economists surveyed by Bloomberg was a 1.11 million rate. Ground-breaking on multifamily dwellings jumped 29.4 percent.

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Ford F-150 Sales

USA Today is reporting:

In a move that sometimes spells sales trouble, Ford is offering discounts of up to $10,479 for its most important vehicle, the F-150 pickup.

The discounts are featured this week on Ford's website, and vary by region. The highest discounts were found in places including Washington, D.C., but even pickup havens like California were seeing discounts of more than $7,000. They appeared to apply to only the larger, more deluxe versions that often carry higher price tags.

The discounting is unusual because the highly revised 2015 F-150 is relatively new in the market. The current version has an aluminum body to save weight, and thus fuel. Not only is the F-150 the nation's best-selling vehicle, but it's also considered one of the most profitable, at least compared to cars.

But sales were down 8.9% last month and at 55,171 in sales, F Series only outsold perrennial No. 2 pickup Chevrolet Silverado by about 4,000 vehicles. Silverado gained 18.4% in sales for the month. Ford officials have blamed tight supplies for the sales droop, but analysts aren't so sure.

These guys know about this a lot more than I do, but discounting on pick-ups is hardly new. I see it all the time. In addition, maintaining market share is incredibly important for Ford; bragging rights to being #1 is worth every penny. Even Saudi Arabia knows how important market share is, even if it has to give its oil away.

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Pocket Of Optimism: Silicon Valley

Or Irrational Exuberance

The WSJ  is reporting:

Many in Silicon Valley say it is just a matter of time before new innovations surface in salable products and goose the official productivity tally. First, though, businesses must harness the innovations to the products they sell. Driverless car technology, for example, won’t hit city streets for a while.

U.S. productivity, meanwhile, has hit the skids. From 1948 to 1973, it grew at an annual average of 2.8%. The rate through the 1980s slowed to half that, even as computers spread through the economy, driving everything from welding robots in auto plants to bank ATMs.

In 1987, during the last period of productivity hand-wringing, Nobel Prize winning economist Robert Solow quipped: “You can see the computer age everywhere but in the productivity statistics.”

From 1995 to 2004, it finally looked like the digital age was paying off: Productivity growth rates closed in on post-World War II highs of near 3%. Then average gains fell to 2% from 2005 to 2009; since 2010, they have dipped below 1%. 

The soundbite: the U.S. doesn’t have a productivity problem, it has a measurement problem.

The article is very, very interesting; worth reading, perhaps coming back to later.

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