by Calculated Risk on 10/03/2011 08:48:00 AM

From MarketWatch: Chrysler's U.S. Sept. sales rise 27%

Chrysler Group LLC's U.S. auto sales climbed 27% as the manufacturer posted its strongest September since 2007 and saw double-digit sales increases among its biggest brands.
...
Chrysler ... also estimated the industry's U.S. sales in September at a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 13.2 million.

The key number for the economy is the seasonally adjusted annual sales rate (SAAR) compared to the last few months, not the year-over-year comparison provided by the automakers. Once all the reports are released, I'll post a graph of the estimated total September light vehicle sales (SAAR) - usually around 4 PM ET.

The consensus is for an increase to 12.6 million SAAR, from 12.1 million in August, however I think we will see a stronger increase based on recent manufacturer and dealer reports. This will probably be the strongest month for auto sales since April (13.13 million SAAR) - before the tsunami in Japan.

I'll add the reports from the other major auto companies as updates to this post.

Update: From MarketWatch: GM U.S. vehicle sales total 207,145 in Sept., up 20%

From MarketWatch: Ford Sept. U.S. sales rise 9%

Weekend:
• Summary for Week Ending Sept 30th
• Schedule for Week of Oct 2nd
• A few preliminary comments on the September Employment Report

by Calculated Risk on 10/03/2011 12:50:00 AM

• An overview on Europe from the NY Times: Toil and Trouble Over the Caldron That Is Greece

In the short term, Greece remains the central problem. ... Europe’s strategy, to the extent it can be discerned, is to put off restructuring Greece’s debt as long as possible and build up enough backing for a bailout fund so that banks with large exposure to the sovereign debt of Greece and other troubled euro-zone countries, like Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Spain, can survive an all-but-inevitable Greek default.
...
When speaking privately, officials concede that Greece’s debt ... is unsustainable and that lenders will probably have to write some of it off. A “haircut” of 50 percent, followed by a recapitalization of banks if necessary, is the outcome most commonly mentioned.

Germany and France are not prepared to consider doing that yet, though, in part because relieving the pressure on Greece would remove its incentive to overhaul its finances and make its economy more competitive. ... Equally important, Germany and France want to delay any Greek default, orderly or not, until they have bolstered the rescue fund and taken other steps to protect Italy, the biggest economy in southern Europe.

What a mess.

The Asian markets are red tonight with the Nikkei down 2.6%.

From CNBC: Pre-Market Data and Bloomberg futures: the S&P 500 is down about 8 points, and Dow futures are down about 65 points.

Oil: WTI futures are down to $78 and Brent is down under $102 per barrel.

Yesterday:
• Summary for Week Ending Sept 30th
• Schedule for Week of Oct 2nd

by Calculated Risk on 10/02/2011 04:46:00 PM

From the Financial Times: Greek cabinet approves budget cuts

[Finance Minister] Venizelos has agreed to eliminate 30,000 public sector jobs by December ... About 23,000 workers nearing retirement will lose their positions. Another 7,000 will be made redundant after mergers and restructurings ... “Given that we’re taking such tough measures ... the sixth tranche is assured.” [said Venizelos]
excerpt with permission

Cutting jobs means putting workers into "reserve" and they are still paid 60% of their salary.

And from Deutche Welle: Greece misses EU and IMF deficit targets

Greece announced late Sunday that its budget deficit will reach 8.5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) this year, below the initial target of 7.6 percent.

According to a statement issued by the Finance Ministry, Greece will manage to bring the budget deficit down to 6.8 per cent of GDP next year, but it will still miss the bailout target of 6.5 per cent of GDP.

"Because three critical months remain for the completion of the financial year 2011, and the final estimate of 8.5 per cent of GDP deficit can be achieved if the state mechanism and citizens respond accordingly," the finance ministry statement said.

The troika is still working on pay cuts for higher-paid officials.

Yesterday:
• Summary for Week Ending Sept 30th
• Schedule for Week of Oct 2nd

by Calculated Risk on 10/02/2011 12:32:00 PM

Yesterday:
• Summary for Week Ending Sept 30th
• Schedule for Week of Oct 2nd

The September employment report will be released on Friday and the consensus is for an increase of 65,000 non-farm payroll jobs in September, up from the zero jobs added in August. Goldman Sachs is forecasting an increase of 50,000 jobs in September.

A key point to remember is that the Verizon labor dispute subtracted 45,000 jobs from the August report and those jobs will be added back in the September report. So even if September was the same as August, we would see 45,000 more jobs added.

Note: The Verizon labor dispute didn't show up in the ADP employment report because the ADP counts employees on the payroll even if they aren't working.

Another key point is that the manufacturing surveys (a small percentage of overall employment) mostly suggested employment expansion in September - and an improvement from August (See table below). Also the Chicago PMI indicated stronger employment expansion in September than in August.

However weekly initial unemployment claims for the BLS reference week were higher in September than in August - suggesting more layoffs. Still - overall - it appears September was somewhat better than August.

Here is a table for the various employment components from several surveys in September starting in August 2007 (before the recession). Here is the spreadsheet in excel. Most of these surveys are just for manufacturing (Fed surveys), however the Chicago PMI includes both manufacturing and services.

Note: Above 50 is expansion for the Chicago PMI, above 0 is expansion for the Fed manufacturing surveys.

Employment Surveys through Sept 2011 Above 50 is expansion for Chicago PMI, All others above zero
	Chicago PMI	NY Fed (Empire State)	Philly Fed	Richmond Fed	Kansas City Fed	Dallas Fed	Avg Fed Mfg Surveys
Aug-07	53.2	11.8	14.7	-1	0	1.6	5.4
Sep-07	51.8	19.2	4.3	0	-1	7.2	5.9
Oct-07	50.2	17.4	7.3	-3	-2	5.8	5.1
Nov-07	52.6	7.1	4.0	-2	-5	2.0	1.2
Dec-07	49.3	5.0	1.3	4	4	-3.3	2.2
Jan-08	47.0	2.4	1.5	-2	12	9.0	4.6
Feb-08	33.5	-2.1	6.2	-2	1	5.5	1.7
Mar-08	44.6	4.5	0.6	-7	-3	4.6	-0.1
Apr-08	35.3	0.0	-4.2	-14	0	2.0	-3.2
May-08	41.2	1.1	-1.9	-10	-2	-5.9	-3.7
Jun-08	46.7	1.2	-8.7	-14	-13	-4.4	-7.8
Jul-08	45.9	-6.3	-6.2	-4	1	7.1	-1.7
Aug-08	39.2	-4.5	-8.4	-19	-3	-5.3	-8.0
Sep-08	49.1	-4.6	-4.5	-21	-11	-5.1	-9.2
Oct-08	41.5	-3.7	-22.3	-22	-14	-11.5	-14.7
Nov-08	33.4	-28.9	-26.5	-25	-22	-20.1	-24.5
Dec-08	39.6	-23.4	-31.3	-34	-32	-21.0	-28.3
Jan-09	34.8	-26.1	-37.1	-29	-34	-28.2	-30.9
Feb-09	25.2	-39.1	-41.0	-33	-33	-40.1	-37.2
Mar-09	28.1	-38.2	-49.6	-29	-35	-50.3	-40.4
Apr-09	31.8	-28.1	-38.8	-28	-23	-39.7	-31.5
May-09	25.0	-23.9	-29.8	-17	-16	-34.1	-24.2
Jun-09	28.9	-21.8	-23.2	-13	-13	-27.8	-19.8
Jul-09	35.3	-20.8	-23.7	-14	-16	-23.4	-19.6
Aug-09	38.7	-7.5	-18.1	-12	-10	-15.4	-12.6
Sep-09	38.8	-8.3	-16.1	-4	-2	-8.9	-7.9
Oct-09	38.3	10.4	-10.4	-4	-4	-12.2	-4.0
Nov-09	41.9	1.3	-3.5	-10	-2	-15.8	-6.0
Dec-09	51.2	-5.3	3.7	2	-4	-3.8	-1.5
Jan-10	59.8	4.0	6.2	2	2	-3.7	2.1
Feb-10	53.0	5.6	8.0	7	-2	-4.2	2.9
Mar-10	53.1	12.4	9.3	8	2	4.5	7.2
Apr-10	57.2	20.3	7.4	19	5	11.6	12.7
May-10	49.2	22.4	3.4	7	2	13.8	9.7
Jun-10	54.2	12.4	-1.0	2	0	7.1	4.1
Jul-10	56.6	7.9	6.6	8	5	7.2	6.9
Aug-10	55.5	14.3	-3.9	3	-1	-3.3	1.8
Sep-10	53.4	14.9	1.4	-1	-2	3.7	3.4
Oct-10	54.6	21.7	1.4	5	0	-2.5	5.1
Nov-10	56.3	9.1	11.7	10	8	7.1	9.2
Dec-10	60.2	-3.4	4.3	15	11	16.1	8.6
Jan-11	64.1	8.4	17.6	14	8	9.3	11.5
Feb-11	59.8	3.6	23.6	15	23	10.5	15.1
Mar-11	65.6	9.1	18.2	16	25	11.6	16.0
Apr-11	63.7	23.1	12.3	12	17	13.4	15.6
May-11	60.8	24.7	22.1	16	9	11.6	16.7
Jun-11	58.7	10.2	4.1	14	17	5.3	10.1
Jul-11	51.5	1.1	8.9	4	4	12.1	6.0
Aug-11	52.1	3.3	-5.2	1	8	5.4	2.5
Sep-11	60.6	-5.4	5.8	7	12	13.4	6.6

by Calculated Risk on 10/02/2011 09:04:00 AM

From KFDM: Gasoline prices are plunging across Texas

The average price for a gallon of gasoline is plunging in Southeast Texas and across the state, according to a survey released Thursday by AAA Texas.

The average is $3.22 a gallon in Beaumont, down 13 cents from last week. The average one year ago was $2.56. The record high was $4 a gallon in July, 2008.

The graph below shows indicates gasoline prices are down sharply over the last couple of weeks.

Note: This graph show oil prices for WTI; gasoline prices in most of the U.S. are impacted more by Brent prices.

Brent Crude is down to $102.76 and WTI is down to $79.20.

Orange County Historical Gas Price Charts Provided by GasBuddy.com

Yesterday:
• Summary for Week Ending Sept 30th
• Schedule for Week of Oct 2nd