by Calculated Risk on 2/10/2020 11:44:00 AM

Another update ... during the recession, I wrote about the troubles in Las Vegas and included a chart of visitor and convention attendance: Lost Vegas.

Since then both Las Vegas visitor and convention traffic has recovered.

Visitor traffic was up 1.0% from 2018, and about 1.0% below the record set in 2016.

Here is the data from the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority.  

Click on graph for larger image.

The blue bars are annual visitor traffic (left scale), and the red line is convention attendance (right scale). 

Convention traffic was up 2.3% in 2019 compared to 2018, and was slightly above the previous record set in 2017.

There were many housing related conventions during the housing bubble, so it took some time for convention traffic to recover.   Now there are marijuana conventions boosting traffic!

From the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority:

While usually a relatively slower convention month, December 2019 bucked the trend as the destination enjoyed particularly strong convention attendance estimated at 356,100, +60.6% over last December; the YoY increase is largely due to the scheduling of Amazon Web Services (65k attendees) and Marijuana Business Conference (35k attendees) in December this year vs. November in 2018, plus the rotation of American Society of Health‐System Pharmacists (20k attendees) into the destination.

by Calculated Risk on 2/10/2020 10:03:00 AM

The Northwest Multiple Listing Service reported Home buyers in Western Washington “hit the ground running” in January

“All indicators point to a vigorous spring market,” suggested broker Dean Rebhuhn when reviewing just-released statistics from Northwest Multiple Listing Service. The report covering 23 counties shows pending sales outgained new listings, record-low inventory that’s down 33% from a year ago, and double-digit price increases.
...
Northwest MLS members tallied 5,074 closed sales during January for a 4.3% increase from the year-ago total of 4,865. Median prices jumped 10.7% from a year ago.
…
At the end of January, the MLS database totaled only 7,791 active listings of single family homes and condos, well-below the year-ago figure of 11,687 (down 33.3%). A check of records dating to 2005 shows the selection is at a new low level, shrinking below the previous low of 7,921 reported for February 2018. In fact, for the 15 year span from 2005-2019 (180 months), inventory has dipped below 10,000 listings during only eight of those months.

Measured by months of supply (the ratio of active listings to closed sales), there was 1.54 months of inventory system-wide at the end of January.
emphasis added

The press release is for the Northwest. In King County, sales were up 5.7% year-over-year, and active inventory was down 42.6% year-over-year.

In Seattle, sales were up 17.2% year-over-year, and inventory was down 32.9% year-over-year..  This puts the months-of-supply in Seattle at just 1.38 months.

by Calculated Risk on 2/09/2020 07:52:00 PM

Weekend:
• Schedule for Week of February 9, 2020

• Weather Adjusted Employment Gains in January

Monday:
• No major economic releases scheduled.

From CNBC: Pre-Market Data and Bloomberg futures: S&P 500 are down 11 and DOW futures are down 90 (fair value).

Oil prices were down over the last week with WTI futures at $49.86 per barrel and Brent at $53.98 barrel.  A year ago, WTI was at $53, and Brent was at $61 - so oil prices are down about 10% year-over-year.

Here is a graph from Gasbuddy.com for nationwide gasoline prices. Nationally prices are at $2.43 per gallon. A year ago prices were at $2.28 per gallon, so gasoline prices are up 15 cents per gallon year-over-year.

by Calculated Risk on 2/09/2020 12:40:00 PM

From HotelNewsNow.com: STR: US hotel results for week ending 1 February

The U.S. hotel industry reported positive year-over-year results in the three key performance metrics during the week of 26 January through 1 February 2020, according to data from STR.

In comparison with the week of 27 January through 2 February 2019, the industry recorded the following:

• Occupancy: +1.7% to 57.6%
• Average daily rate (ADR): +2.2% to US$127.94
• Revenue per available room (RevPAR): +4.0% to US$73.73
emphasis added

The following graph shows the seasonal pattern for the hotel occupancy rate using the four week average.

Click on graph for larger image.

The red line is for 2020, dash light blue is 2019, blue is the median, and black is for 2009 (the worst year probably since the Great Depression for hotels).

2020 is off to a solid start, however, STR notes that the new coronavirus could have a significant negative impact on hotels:

As fears over an outbreak of the new coronavirus centered in Wuhan, China, continue to restrict travel, visits to the U.S. from China could drop by 25% in 2020, according to analysis by Tourism Economics.

Speaking on a webinar Thursday titled “U.S. economy and hotel industry 2020 outlook: Navigating the slowdown,” Adam Sacks, president of Tourism Economics, said a 25% drop in Chinese visitors to the U.S. means a loss of 4 million hotel roomnights and $5.8 billion in visitor spending in 2020, and ultimately 7.8 million roomnights and $10.3 billion in spending through 2024.

This analysis was based on historical data from SARS. Based on more recent data, it appears the new coronavirus will have a larger impact than SARS.

Seasonally, the 4-week average of the occupancy rate will increase over the next several months.

Data Source: STR, Courtesy of HotelNewsNow.com

by Calculated Risk on 2/08/2020 11:07:00 AM

The weather boosted employment gains in January. The question is: how much?

The BLS reported 226 thousand people were employed in non-agriculture industries, with a job, but not at work due to bad weather. The average for January over the previous 10 years was 347 thousand.

The BLS also reported 744 thousand people were usually full time employees, but were working part time in January due to bad weather.  The average for January over the previous 10 years was 1.2 million.

Both of the series suggest weather negatively impacted employment less than usual (boosting seasonally adjusted employment).

The San Francisco Fed estimates Weather-Adjusted Change in Total Nonfarm Employment (monthly change, seasonally adjusted). They use local area weather to estimate the impact on employment. For January, the BLS reported 225 thousand jobs added, the San Francisco Fed estimates that weather adjusted employment gains were 125 thousand.

So we should expect some payback in coming months.   (Note: One of the reasons I took the "over" in January was because of the weather)

by Calculated Risk on 2/08/2020 08:11:00 AM

The key reports this week are January CPI and retail sales.

For manufacturing, the January Industrial Production report will be released.

Fed Chair Powell testifies to Congress this week.

----- Monday, Feb 10th -----
No major economic releases scheduled.

----- Tuesday, Feb 11th -----
6:00 AM ET: NFIB Small Business Optimism Index for January.

10:00 AM ET: Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey for December from the BLS.

This graph shows job openings (yellow line), hires (purple), Layoff, Discharges and other (red column), and Quits (light blue column) from the JOLTS.

Jobs openings decreased in November to 6.800 million from 7.361 million in October.

The number of job openings (yellow) were down 11% year-over-year, and Quits were up 5% year-over-year.

10:00 AM: Testimony, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, Semiannual Monetary Policy Report to the Congress, Before the Committee on Financial Services, U.S. House of Representatives

11:00 AM: NY Fed: Q4 Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit

----- Wednesday, Feb 12th -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

10:00 AM: Testimony, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, Semiannual Monetary Policy Report to the Congress, Before the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs, U.S. Senate

----- Thursday, Feb 13th -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released. The consensus is for 212,000 initial claims, up from 202,000 last week.

8:30 AM: The Consumer Price Index for January from the BLS. The consensus is for 0.2% increase in CPI, and a 0.2% increase in core CPI.

----- Friday, Feb 14th -----
8:30 AM: Retail sales for January is scheduled to be released.  The consensus is for a 0.3% increase in retail sales.

This graph shows the year-over-year change in retail sales and food service (ex-gasoline) since 1993. In December, Retail and Food service sales, ex-gasoline, increased by 5.5% on a YoY basis.

9:15 AM: The Fed will release Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization for January.

This graph shows industrial production since 1967.

The consensus is for a 0.2% decrease in Industrial Production, and for Capacity Utilization to decrease to 76.8%.

10:00 AM: University of Michigan's Consumer sentiment index (Preliminary for February). The consensus is for a reading of 99.3.

by Calculated Risk on 2/07/2020 02:58:00 PM

A few weeks ago I wrote The Record Job Streak: A few Comments. I noted that the streak of consecutive positive headline job reports had reached 111 months, but the streak might be over when the annual benchmark revision was released.

The headline job streak lives!

With the benchmark revision, February 2019 was revised down to +1 thousand jobs added - so the streak barely survived - and the streak is now at 112 months. If the headline job streak continues into 2020, then the headline streak will probably end in June 2020 when a large number of temporary Census workers are let go.

The job streak ex-Census was even longer (adjusting for temporary Census hires).  Prior to the benchmark release, the ex-Census streak was at 118 months.  However, with the revisions, the ex-Census job streak ended in February 2019 at 107 months.  It is possible that the ex-Census streak will be resurrected with the next benchmark release, but for now it is over.

by Calculated Risk on 2/07/2020 02:46:00 PM

From the Association of American Railroads (AAR) Rail Time Indicators. Graphs and excerpts reprinted with permission.

U.S. rail volumes fell again in January, but there were glimmers of hope. Nine of the 20 carload categories the AAR tracks had year-over-year gains in January 2020, the most in a year, and several other commodities had carload declines in January that were smaller than they’ve been in recent months.

Total U.S. rail carloads fell 5.9%, or 73,110 carloads, in January 2020 from January 2019, their 12th straight decline.
...
U.S. intermodal originations fell 5.4%, or 71,081 units, in January and have now fallen for 12 consecutive months.
emphasis added

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph from the Rail Time Indicators report shows the six week average of U.S. Carloads in 2018, 2019 and 2020:

Total originated carloads on U.S. railroads fell 5.9% (73,110 carloads) in January 2020 from January 2019, their 12th consecutive monthly decline. Weekly average total carloads in January 2020 were 233,147, the second-lowest weekly average for any month since January 1988, when our data begin. (Only December 2019 was lower, at 232,026.)

The second graph shows the six week average of U.S. intermodal in 2018, 2019 and 2020: (using intermodal or shipping containers):

Meanwhile, total U.S. intermodal originations (which are not included in the carload numbers) were down 5.4% (71,081 containers and trailers) in January, also their 12th consecutive monthly decline

by Calculated Risk on 2/07/2020 12:29:00 PM

From Merrill Lynch:

We are forecasting 1.0% for 1Q. [Feb 7 estimate]
emphasis added

From the NY Fed Nowcasting Report

The New York Fed Staff Nowcast stands at 1.7% for 2020:Q1. [Feb 7 estimate]

And from the Altanta Fed: GDPNow

The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the first quarter of 2020 is 2.7 percent on February 7, down from 2.9 percent on February 5. [Feb 7 estimate]

CR Note: These very early estimates suggest real GDP growth will be between 1.0% and 2.7% annualized in Q1.

by Calculated Risk on 2/07/2020 09:44:00 AM

The headline jobs number at 225 thousand for January was above consensus expectations of 162 thousand, and the previous two months were revised up 7 thousand, combined. The unemployment rate increase to 3.6%. Note: It appears weather boosted employment in January - I'll have more on this later.

Earlier: January Employment Report: 225,000 Jobs Added, 3.6% Unemployment Rate

In January, the year-over-year employment change was 2.052 million jobs including Census hires.

The annual benchmark revision showed a reduction in jobs in March 2019 of 505 thousand (close to the preliminary estimate of the downward revision).

With these revisions, the record job streak remained alive - although February 2019 was revised down to just +1 thousand jobs added.  (Note: Excluding temporary Census hiring, the job streak ended in February 2019 - since the Census hired +1 thousand workers in Feb 2019).

Average Hourly Earnings

Wage growth was below expectations. From the BLS:

"In January, average hourly earnings for all employees on private nonfarm payrolls rose by 7 cents to $28.44. Over the past 12 months, average hourly earnings have increased by 3.1 percent."

This graph is based on “Average Hourly Earnings” from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) (aka "Establishment") monthly employment report. Note: There are also two quarterly sources for earnings data: 1) “Hourly Compensation,” from the BLS’s Productivity and Costs; and 2) the Employment Cost Index which includes wage/salary and benefit compensation.

The graph shows the nominal year-over-year change in "Average Hourly Earnings" for all private employees.  Nominal wage growth was at 3.1% YoY in January.

Wage growth had been generally trending up, but weakened in 2019.

Prime (25 to 54 Years Old) Participation

Since the overall participation rate has declined due to cyclical (recession) and demographic (aging population, younger people staying in school) reasons, here is the employment-population ratio for the key working age group: 25 to 54 years old.

In the earlier period the participation rate for this group was trending up as women joined the labor force. Since the early '90s, the participation rate moved more sideways, with a downward drift starting around '00 - and with ups and downs related to the business cycle.

The 25 to 54 participation rate was increased in January to 83.1%, and the 25 to 54 employment population ratio increased to 80.6%.

Part Time for Economic Reasons

From the BLS report:

"The number of persons employed part time for economic reasons, at 4.2 million, was essentially unchanged in January. These individuals, who would have preferred full-time employment, were working part time because their hours had been reduced or they were unable to find full-time jobs."

The number of persons working part time for economic reasons increased in January to 4.182 million from 4.148 million in December.   The number of persons working part time for economic reason has been generally trending down.

These workers are included in the alternate measure of labor underutilization (U-6) that increased to 6.9% in January.

Unemployed over 26 Weeks

This graph shows the number of workers unemployed for 27 weeks or more.

According to the BLS, there are 1.166 million workers who have been unemployed for more than 26 weeks and still want a job. This was down from 1.186 million in December.

This was the lowest level for long term unemployed since June 2007.

Summary:

The headline jobs number was above expectations, and the previous two months were revised up slightly.  The headline unemployment rate increase to 3.6%; wage growth picked up to 3.1% year-over-year.  Overall this was a solid report, although there was probably some boost from the weather.