Consumer Economy
Existing Home Sales (EXHOSLUSM495S) 4.09M -100K (-2.39% m/m)
Existing Home Sales continue chopping along the lows. A “BOOMING” value for this series is 6 million, while a “lame” value is around 4 million.
The Reason Socialism Appeals to the Youth [July 9]
- The Fox News analysis citing Heartland Institute and Rasmussen polling noted that 53% of Americans aged 18 to 39 said they would support a Democratic Socialist for president, while 76% favored nationalizing industries such as health care, energy, and big tech. The overwhelming motivation is not ideology, it is economic despair.
- 74% of young voters believe America is facing a housing crisis, 62% say the economy is unfair to young people, and 36% describe themselves as struggling financially or in outright crisis. When asked why they supported democratic socialism, the most common answer was simple: housing costs. [bold added]
(source – armstrongeconomics)
Credit and Rates
- Total Bank Credit (TOTBKCR) 19.6B -36.3B (-0.18% w/w)
- Fed Balance Sheet (WALCL) 6.74T +11.0B (+0.16% w/w)
- US 30 Year Mortgage Rate (MORTGAGE30US) 6.49% +6 bp
- 3-Month Treasury (DGS3MO) 3.79% +3 bp
- 1-Year Treasury (DGS1) 4.06% +12 bp
- 10-Year Treasury (DGS10) 4.56% +7 bp
- 30-Year Treasury (DGS30) 5.06% +8 bp
- 20+ Treasury ETF (TLT.N) -1.22% w/w
- US Government Confidence (AAA10Y) 1.14% +3 bp
Bank credit fell this week – wiping out the past two weeks of increase. Does this mark a trend change? One week is too soon to tell.
The Fed printed money this week (OMG), making up for the reverse-printing they did last week. Same timeframe for “money printing” as for bank credit – not much change in money printing over the past few months. I suspect if bank credit starts to seriously decline, the Fed might decide to print a bit more.
Rates jumped higher again this week, with money racing most rapidly out of the 1-year. Most of the move happened on Tuesday. To me, this is suggesting a Fed rate increase, alongside increased inflation expectations. Given the (mostly) unchanged USD, it probably wasn’t driven by a lack of confidence in US assets – otherwise we’d have seen a USD smash alongside rising rates.
The outflows hit TLT for a 1.22% loss for the week – a second week of Fauci Ouchie for the
by cmartenson 
