The Market, Energy, And Political Page, Part 3, T+19 -- June 19, 2018 -- Starbucks, GE, UPS, Social Security Disability And All That Jazz

Social Security Disability

Staggering. Link here. 

The number of Americans seeking Social Security disability benefits is plunging, a startling reversal of a decades-old trend that threatened the program’s solvency.

It is the latest evidence of a stronger economy pulling people back into the job market or preventing workers from being sidelined in the first place. drop is so significant that the agency has revised its estimates of how long the program will continue to be financially secure.

This month, the government announced that the program would not run out of money until 2032, four years later than its previous estimate last year. Two years ago, the government had warned that the funds might be depleted by 2023.

In case you missed that:

• this month: Social Security Disability is projected to be solvent until 2032
• 2017: Social Security Disability was projected to be depleted by 2028
• 2015: Social Security Disability was projected to be depleted by 2023
• there seems to be a trend here

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Starbucks

Starbucks closing 150 stores. Link here.

Starbucks also plans to close about 150 company-operated stores in densely penetrated U.S. markets next fiscal year, three times the number it historically shuts down annually.

Something tells me the "densely-penetrated" areas are the same areas where the homeless need a place to hang out. This is not rocket science.

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UPS

 
UPS: this story caught me by surprise. It was the headline that confused me. This was the headline:

UPS strays form electric with $130 million investment in natural gas fleet. 

The fact that the headline mentioned "electric" suggested to me they were talking about the neighborhood trucks you see every day near where you live. No, this has to do with long-haul. EVs might work well  for short-haul, last-mile delivery, but EVs would never do (at least not yet, no matter what Elon Musk says) for long-haul. This article was about long-haul. The writer of the article must have been a bit confused. From the linked article: 

United Parcel Service Inc. said Tuesday (today) it will build an additional five compressed CNG fueling stations, plus more than 700 new CNG vehicles, including 400 semi-tractors and 330 terminal trucks. The new CNG stations will be in Goodyear, Ariz.; Plainfield, Ind.; Edgerton, Kan.; Fort Worth, Texas; and Arlington, Texas. UPS said it plans to deploy the new CNG vehicles on routes to utilize the new CNG stations, as well as adding to existing natural gas fleets in other UPS locations.

Actually, I'm not even sure the neighborhood UPS trucks are good candidates for batteries. CNG makes better sense for their entire fleet -- for a number of reasons. One reason: it's a lot more cost efficient to have the entire fleet using the same fuel, instead of mixing/matching with gasoline, diesel, electricity, CNG. 

By the way, note that of the five new locations, two of them are just down the street from where I live: one in Fort Worth, TX; and, one in Arlington, TX (the latter sits between Fort Worth and Dallas).

• one word: Amazon. Many Amazon fulfillment centers in this area
• another word: airport. DFW. Huge UPS hub
• a third word: Toyota. Toyota's US headquarters are now in Plano, TX -- just north of DFW. The area is crawling with subcontractors and suppliers for Toyota

Also at SeekingAlpha.  

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GE

GE booted out of the Dow: Link here. GEEEE -- I just blogged about this exactly one week ago:

Dow components: I will leave it up to the reader, but when you get right down to it, the Dow (30) is an incredibly stodgy, old white man's list. The best thing the makers and shakers could do, "modernize the Dow." Maybe they are waiting for leadership at Berkshire Hathaway to change. I would remove the following and replace with any number of other great candidates: GE; HD; IBM; INTC; JNJ; KO; MRK; PG; TRV; maybe others. Maybe change 15 of the 30. Without question the S&P 500 is a better market basket to follow.

GE will be replaced by a "non-industrial," "non-conglomerate" as it were. It will be replaced by Walgreens Boots Alliance, a "drugstore."