Month: October 2022

Job Cuts Surge 46% In September 2022, Up 68% From Same Month Last Year September Hiring Intentions Fall To Lowest Level Since 2011

(…) “Some cracks are beginning to appear in the labor market. Hiring is slowing and downsizing events are beginning to occur,” said Andrew Challenger, Senior Vice President of Challenger, Gray & Christmas, Inc. (…)

“Typically, Retail and Transportation/Warehousing are ramping up hiring for the holiday season and announcing their plans in September. This low figure suggests companies that typically staff seasonal hires are waiting to see whether consumers will show up for the holiday season,” said Challenger.

• Amazon to Hire 150,000 Workers Before Holiday Season The e-commerce company recently raised hourly pay to entice job candidates.

The hiring target Amazon announced Thursday is the same as it had last year and comes as the e-commerce company has been struggling with slower sales. (…) The company shed almost 100,000 employees during its second quarter to end the period with roughly 1.5 million staff members. Much of that reduction took place at its warehouses.

Walmart Inc. WMT -0.93%▼ has scaled back its holiday hiring as consumer demand has fallen amid higher prices and strained household budgets. The company said last month that it planned to hire about 40,000 mostly seasonal employees for the holidays, far lower than the 150,000 permanent workers it sought last year. (…)

• J.T. O’Donnell, a career coach, says she hears rising worries from applicants about the once-booming job market (via N.Y. Times): “I watch the train wreck in slow motion. All these people thought: ‘Oh, when I’m ready to go back to work it’ll be no problem.’ And now it’s a problem.” (Axios)

INFLATION WATCH

Costco Not Ready to Cut Prices as Shipping, Commodities Costs Fall Rising labor costs and prices that were locked in with suppliers months ago are keeping inflationary pressures on the retailer

(…) It can take anywhere from six months to a year before lower shipping costs translate into falling prices for consumers, said Chuck Grom, a managing director at Gordon Haskett Research Advisors. Higher costs in other business areas can delay price drops even longer.

Hourly employees, which account for about 90% of Costco’s workers, earn more than $25 an hour on average in the U.S., according to Mr. Galanti, following a string of pay increases over the past 18 months. The company looks to attract and retain workers in competitive job markets, such as Seattle, said Mr. Galanti. These cost pressures will persist, as wages don’t tend to come down once they have gone up, Mr. Galanti said. Costco had around 285,000 employees at the end of June. (…)

Costco reported absorbing price inflation of around 8% in the quarter ended Aug. 28, up from 7%-plus in the previous quarter and a range of 3.5% to 4.5% a year earlier. (…)

• Waiting for a better time to buy a car? Keep waiting

Average car prices are shooting higher and higher thanks to continued auto parts shortages. Interest rates are rocketing higher thanks to the federal government’s efforts to control inflation. And car companies and dealers have less incentive to take steps to bring down costs because demand is still vastly greater than supply.

The end result: Don’t expect the car market to return to normal anytime soon.

The average new car loan interest rate reached 5.7% in the third quarter of 2022, the highest it’s been since 2019, according to Edmunds.com. At the same time, the average amount financed to purchase a new car reached an all-time record of $41,347. The average monthly payment in the third quarter was over $700. It was $630 in the same quarter last year, and the average down payment was almost $1,000 less then, too, according to Edmunds.com. (…)

In past years, when the Fed pushed up interest rates, car makers would come out with artificially low interest rate car loans – sometimes even 0% – as a purchase incentive. But with few cars to sell, there’s little incentive to do that sort of thing now, Caldwell said. (…)

These high costs will be hard on consumers but it still won’t reduce demand enough to ease pressure on car prices, at least in the near term, analysts interviewed by CNN Business said. That’s because demand for new cars is already so far outstripping the supply – hence the high prices – that the reduction in demand caused by these even higher payments still won’t bring things back in line. Car dealers can still sell every new car that comes onto their lots, often even before the car carrier trucks delivers them. Customers will just have to pay more. (…)

The inventory shortage is starting to ease just a bit, said Smoke. In the last few months, there have been a couple of hundred thousand more vehicles on dealer lots, he said.

“It’s not across the board on all models, but it’s principally domestic North American production,” he said. (…)

• “A $10-per-barrel increase in the price of oil would shave only 0.1% from U.S. real GDP growth over the subsequent year.” (Moody’s)
• “Per Okun’s law, a 1-percentage point deceleration in GDP growth over the course of a year would trim employment growth by around 800,000 jobs per annum. This would also increase the unemployment rate by about 0.5 percentage point and shave a few basis points off year-over-year growth in both the consumer price index and PCE deflator.” (Moody’s)

Bank of Canada’s Macklem Says ‘More to Be Done’ on Taming Inflation Canada central banker plays down slowing economy, suggests little evidence that underlying, or core, inflation is decelerating

(…) the labor market remains “very tight,” job vacancies are at elevated levels, and wage growth has climbed and continues to broaden. (…) “All signs point to an economy that is clearly in excess demand,” he said. “The clear implication is that further rate increases are warranted.” (…)

The Canadian dollar’s depreciation, “if it’s sustained, will be a countervailing force” in the central bank’s efforts to cool inflation, Mr. Macklem said. (…)

TRANSITORY REDEFINED! “From [today], all price increases are forbidden. Forbidden! From today. Not from tomorrow, from today. So that prices aren’t driven up in the next 24 hours. “ Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko (ADG)

SENTIMENT WATCH

Retail Army selling the rally 

Retail traders used to be happy dip buyers, but they were sellers for the second week in a row. Is this a contrarian factor? This past week they net sold -$1.1B. Notably they sold the rally on both Monday (SPX +2.59%) and Tuesday (+3.06%). Retail traders net sold -$2.4B of single stocks. Large cap tech names including AAPL (-$470MM), META (-$134MM), and GOOG (-$128MM), in particular, suffered from heavy selling. The last two weeks represented the worst selling in single stocks since March 2020. This bearish sentiment was also evident in the options market. Retail traders sold -$1.0B of delta. (The Market Ear)

JPM retail radar

There was the Fed Put, no more. There was the retail “buy-the-dip” cushion, no more.

BofA: Financial conditions have tightened and are near peaks observed over the past three decades

@MikeZaccardi

THE WEALTH EFFECT

The fragile stock market is also important to watch as the Fed pushes rates higher. Stock prices are sliding again, down almost 25% from the all-time high at the start of the year. This translates into a loss in stock wealth of $12.5 trillion, of which an estimated $7.5 trillion is owned by U.S. households. The impact this loss of wealth has on consumer spending, known as the wealth effect, is estimated to be approximately one penny. That is, consumers will reduce their spending by one cent due to a one dollar decline in their stock wealth in the year after the decline in wealth.

Thus the $7.5 trillion in lost stock wealth will reduce consumer spending by $75 billion in the coming year, equal to 0.3% of GDP. This is a meaningful but modest impact, and likely close to what the Fed would like to see in its effort to slow growth and inflation.

However, the stock wealth effect is highly variable and difficult to gauge. Indeed, on average through the business cycle it is estimated at closer to 2.5 cents. The estimate is much smaller currently because high net worth households that own the bulk of the stocks have substantial excess savings built up during the pandemic. Those in the top quintile of the income distribution have close to $50,000 in excess savings. With cushions so large, the decline in stock wealth won’t compel these households to save more. Moreover, the decline in stock prices simply puts them back where they were at the start of 2021, before that year’s surge in stock prices.

Shareholders likely never really thought they were as wealthy as the value of their stockholdings suggested at the start of 2022, so they aren’t as affected by the decline. If the stock wealth effect is still 2.5 cents, then the slide in stock prices to date would reduce consumer spending by 0.75% of GDP. For an economy otherwise just skirting recession, this would be enough to push it over the edge. Of course, the wealth effect will be larger and the recession deeper if the stock market continues to slide. In a typical recession, stock prices fall by closer to 30% peak to trough. (Moody’s)

EARNINGS WATCH

Samsung Expects Earnings to Slump as Consumer Spending Slips Memory-chip and smartphone businesses feel effects of high inflation and other economic pressures

On Friday, the tech company projected third-quarter operating profit of 10.8 trillion South Korean won, or roughly the equivalent of $7.7 billion, a 32% drop from the prior year’s 15.8 trillion won.

Revenue for the quarter ended Sept. 30 is expected to increase year over year by 2.7% to 76 trillion won, the company said.

Analysts polled by FactSet were on average expecting roughly 11.9 trillion won in operating profit and 78.2 trillion won in revenue.

In June, Samsung’s operating profit for the July-September period was expected to be around 15.9 trillion won, according to FactSet. (…)

Other semiconductor companies are facing tough conditions. Advanced Micro Devices Inc. on Thursday lowered its revenue forecast for the third quarter, after issuing a subdued outlook earlier. AMD said the PC market has weakened significantly in recent months. (…)

• AMD Cuts Revenue Forecast Amid Worst Slump in PC Shipments in Years

The warning follows muted outlooks from a range of chip makers

The chip maker, which sells central processing units for laptops and desktops alongside a large videogame graphics chip business, on Thursday said it expected about $5.6 billion of sales in the just-ended quarter, about $1.1 billion less than it previously said it was expecting when it issued a subdued outlook in August.

Sales in the third quarter are expected to be down 15% from the prior quarter, though up 29% from the year-ago period, when the company formally posts results Nov. 1, AMD said.

“The PC market weakened significantly in the quarter,” AMD Chief Executive Lisa Su said. (…)

AMD said it expects to book a charge of about $160 million mostly to reflect items such as inventory and pricing issues.

• Taiwan Exports ‘Will Only Get Worse’ After First Drop Since 2020 Overseas shipments dropped 5.3% in September compared to a year earlier, according to a statement from the Finance Ministry in Taipei on Friday.

(…) The drop in exports was more severe than the warning officials gave last month of a decline by as much as 3%. (…) Imports fell 2.4% in September, compared to a 3.5% increase in August. Economists had projected a 9.8% increase. That was also the first drop since 2020. (…)

Officials said Friday that they expect October exports to fall by as much as 6% year-on-year as trade continues to be challenged. In a statement, the finance ministry said export performance in the end of the year would be “highly pressured by slowing manufacturing activities around the world” due to rising interest rates and uncertainties caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the “US-China tech war.”

“The tech sector’s impressive strong growth trend since the pandemic seems to have peaked, with Taiwan’s tech export orders falling about 13% from the recent peak” in the first quarter of this year, wrote Grace Ng, an economist at JPMorgan Chase & Co., in a research note earlier this week. (…)

South Korea, the hub of the world’s top memory chipmaker Samsung Electronics, saw its semiconductor output drop in August from a year earlier for the first time in more than four years. The country’s chip inventories also soared 67% as buyers hold off on more purchases, clouding the outlook of an industry that was still booming in the first half of 2022.

So, it’s not a production problem, it’s the demand, stupid!

  Binance Estimates $100 Million Was Stolen in Blockchain Hack Crypto exchange Binance said late Thursday that $100 million was likely stolen as a result of a hack on its Binance Smart Chain blockchain network.

A blockchain hack!!!

U.S. Services PMIs

S&P Global: Business activity declines at slower pace amid renewed rise inclient demand

Despite easing, inflationary pressures in terms of firms’ costs and average selling prices for goods and services remain elevated. With companies also reporting staffing issues and rising wages due to very tight labor market conditions, persistent inflation remains a concern at the same time that the economy appears to be struggling to regain momentum.

US service providers signalled a much slower contraction in business activity during September, according to the latest PMI™ data. The fall in output was only marginal overall, as firms noted that improved demand conditions led to a weaker decline. New orders returned to growth, with domestic sales supporting the upturn, as new export business fell further. The rate of job creation softened to the slowest in 2022 to date, however, as challenges finding and retaining staff persisted. Labor and input shortages sparked a renewed rise in backlogs of work. Hopes of greater client demand, a peaking of inflation and investment in new products drove business expectations for the year-ahead to the highest for four months.

Meanwhile, cost pressures eased for the fourth month running amid reports of some reductions in input prices. Softer increases in operating expenses were mirrored in selling prices, which rose at the slowest pace since the end of 2020.

The seasonally adjusted final S&P Global US Services PMI Business Activity Index registered 49.3 in September,up from 43.7 in August, and broadly in line with the earlier released ‘flash’ estimate of 49.2. The latest data indicated only a slight contraction in US service sector business activity, and the slowest in the current three-month sequence of decline. That said, September data rounded off the second-worst performing quarter for the sector since data collection began in 2009.

Supporting the softer fall in output was a renewed rise in new business at the end of the third quarter. Although only slight and below the series average, the upturn was linked to the acquisition of new customers and greater demand from existing clients.

That said, foreign client demand weighed on the overall rise in total sales as new export orders declined for the fourth month running in September. The fall in new orders from abroad was linked to inflation, the strong dollar and challenging economic conditions in key export markets.

At the same time, firms registered slower increases in input costs and output charges during September. Although still historically elevated and linked to greater material, energy and wage expenses, the overall rate of cost inflation was the softest since January 2021. Companies highlighted lower prices for some inputs, especially imported items.

Reflecting efforts to drive new sales and pass on slower increases in input costs, selling prices rose at the weakest pace since December 2020. Despite firms passing on higher costs to clients, a number noted concessions and discounts made to customers to secure orders.

September data indicated only a modest rise in employment at service providers. The rate of job creation was the slowest since December 2021, as firms stated that challenges hiring new staff and difficulties offering high wages to retain certain employees hampered efforts to expand workforce numbers.

Subsequently, service sector firms recorded a renewed increase in backlogs of work. The expansion in the level of outstanding business was the first for four months, albeit only marginal.

Business expectations at service providers strengthened in September, with the degree of confidence in the outlook for activity in the year ahead reaching the highest since May. Hope of greater client demand and reports of investment in new product lines supported optimism.

• Financials and Consumer Services experience the fastest downturns in business activity

The ISM:

In September, the Services PMI registered 56.7 percent, 0.2 percentage point lower than August’s reading of 56.9 percent. The Business Activity Index registered 59.1 percent, a decrease of 1.8 percentage points compared to the reading of 60.9 percent in August. The New Orders Index figure of 60.6 percent is 1.2 percentage points lower than the August reading of 61.8 percent. (…)

The Prices Index decreased for the fifth consecutive month in September, down 2.8 percentage points to 68.7 percent. (…)

WHAT RESPONDENTS ARE SAYING

• “Sales at our restaurants seasonally trend down from August to October, and this year seems to be more severe compared to before the pandemic. General inflation concerns and consumer uncertainty are the likely causes, expressed by industry peers as well.” [Accommodation & Food Services]
• “General slowdown in sales. We believe high commodity prices and inflation have impacted consumers’ desire for fertilizer from our turf and ornamental division. Farmers have already cut back on consumption due to pricing and weather-related issues.” [Agriculture, Forestry, Fishing & Hunting]
• “September is one of our slowest months of the year. We are gearing up to have a very busy fourth quarter and are seeing some signs of relief in our supply chain.” [Arts, Entertainment & Recreation]
• “Sales have slowed significantly. Very challenging market. Trying to build through backlog. Manufacturers, distributors and installation trades are still busy and passing on price increases, while we are discounting homes to stimulate sales. Margins are compressing.” [Construction]
• “Due to supply chain issues and inflation, we continue to limit purchases and/or start orders sooner than normal. In the higher education sector, the outlook is good for larger schools.” [Educational Services]
• “Labor pressures continue to depress business activity, as insufficient staffing levels are not allowing the hospital system to operate at capacity. Back orders remain unchanged from a month ago as shortages of raw materials — especially surgical grade Tyvek (synthetic polyethylene fiber), foam and plastics — persist and do not appear to be improving. Logistical lead times have decreased, but the impact on supply chains is limited amid product shortages.” [Health Care & Social Assistance]
• “Hiring continues to be a challenge across most industry sectors. There are far more open roles than candidates to fill them. Due to inflationary concerns, companies are being cautious about hiring direct employees and are attempting to utilize contingent labor. The lack of candidates willing to fill temporary positions is making this strategy difficult to execute.” [Professional, Scientific & Technical Services]
• “Chip shortage shows no signs of abating.” [Retail Trade]
• “Prices of fuel are leveling off (or) dropping in small increments. Still facing supply/demand issues with certain products — food, beverages, some raw construction material and semiconductor chips. Big concern is (China’s) zero-tolerance policy for COVID-19 cases. A lot of companies rely on products from China, and cities keep shutting down due to the policy. This greatly affects the orders outstanding and creates lead time uncertainty.” [Transportation & Warehousing]
• “Business activity has improved over last month but is still trending flat to slightly down versus the same period last year. Inventory levels are starting to fall from record highs, but overstocked items are still a problem. We expect lower demand and inventory rebalancing to impact business activity through the end of the calendar year.” [Wholesale Trade]

As far as I can remember, this is the first time this cycle that “the strong dollar” is mentioned by survey participants.

ADP Employment Report: Private Sector Employment Increased by 208,000 Jobs in September; Annual Pay was Up 7.8%

Private sector employment increased by 208,000 jobs in September and annual pay was up 7.8% year-over-year, according to the September ADP® National Employment ReportTM produced by the ADP Research Institute® in collaboration with the Stanford Digital Economy Lab (“Stanford Lab”).

• Goods-producing: -29,000
• Service-providing: +237,000
• Median Change in Annual Pay (ADP matched person sample)
   Job-Stayers 7.8%
   Job-Changers 15.7%

• Goods-producing: 7.0-8.0%
• Service-providing: 6.9-11.9%

OPEC+ Agrees to Biggest Oil Cut Since Start of Pandemic The move to curb output will likely push up already-high global energy prices and help oil-exporting Russia pay for its war in Ukraine.

(…) OPEC+ delegates said the cut would amount to about 600,000 barrels a day less than what producers are actually pumping now. Energy Aspects, a London research consulting firm, said it could amount to a cut of about 1 million barrels from the group’s daily output, an estimate the Saudi energy minister also gave.

“If we have to do more, we will do more,” said Suhail Al Mazrouei, the energy minister of the United Arab Emirates. (…)

Commercial oil stocks in industrialized nations were down 148 million barrels this summer compared with a year ago and 279 million barrels lower than the latest five-year average, OPEC said in its latest report. The group expects demand for its crude to rise by 900,000 barrels a day next year compared with 2022. (…)

In response, the president directed the release of 10 million barrels of oil from the U.S.’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve, the White House said, a move analysts said would have little impact on prices. Administration officials also said they would consult with Congress on ways to rein in OPEC+’s power over energy prices, which analysts interpreted as a potential sign of support for legislation allowing antitrust action against foreign state-owned oil companies. (…)

The OPEC+ production cut will limit Russia’s loss of market share, said delegates, who acknowledged it represented an unprecedented effort by the world’s biggest oil producers to collectively help Russia with the political and economic problems caused by the war in Ukraine. OPEC states, like many countries of the “Global South,” have remained neutral or silent on Russia’s war, as they weigh competing interests that include Russia’s stature as a global grain exporter and a top armaments supplier.

Speaking to Bloomberg television after the meeting, Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said the cuts were needed to “balance the market out.” He said Russia wouldn’t sell oil to countries that adopt the price cap, predicting an oil-supply deficit this year. (…)

• While the oil cartel has often cut production in the face of weakening demand, it has never implemented a cut in such a tight market. This outcome is therefore surprisingly bullish. Utilizing our framing from Monday October 3, a 2 mb/d headline cut would be an effective 1.2 mb/d cut from our Nov-22 expectations from our 27-Sep-22 balances, and an even larger 1.4 mb/d vs our forward balances, if sustained through 2023. (…) the oil market’s buffers (stocks and spare capacity) remain critically low (…). For now, we raise our 4Q22-1Q22 forecasts conservatively by $10/bbl, to $110/$115 respectively, but acknowledge price risks are skewed potentially even higher. (Goldman Sachs)
• U.S. Looks to Ease Venezuela Sanctions, Enabling Chevron to Pump Oil 

(…) Venezuela was once a major oil producer, pumping more than 3.2 million barrels a day during the 1990s, but the state-run industry has collapsed over the past decade because of underinvestment, corruption and mismanagement. (…) Any shift in U.S. policy that brings back Western oil companies would send a psychological signal to the market that more supply is on the way, the people said. (…)

The country is now exporting about 450,000 barrels a day and could double that figure in a matter of months, say people who are familiar with Venezuela’s oil industry and are bullish about its prospects. (…) the country could reach 1.5 million barrels a day of output in two years if Chevron and other companies can work freely. (…)

EARNINGS WATCH

The net percentage of S&P 500 companies that have reduced their sales and EPS guidance is in the 90th percentile (so, many more than usual) but has stabilized recently, said Dennis DeBusschere, founder of 22V Research. Using a natural-language processing tool, earnings sentiment is near recession levels, he said, which is key because how investor emotion shifts as companies post results may help determine the “depth of the slowdown and the risk of a near-term recession.” (22v Research via John Authers)

Truist Advisory Services via The Daily Shot

Double thrusts have never failed

Yes, there has been a massive thrust over the last couple of days; yes, it has never erred in preceding higher returns.

As we saw in March 2020, the last two days have witnessed overwhelming buying interest. On the NYSE, five times more securities advanced than declined, and ten times more volume flowed into advancing than declining securities.

Even going back to 1928, this is a rare occurrence. We have less confidence in breadth metrics before 1962, especially before 1950, so we’ll limit the lookback to then.

When five times as many securities rose as declined on consecutive sessions, the S&P 500 never suffered a negative one-year return. Even over the next six months, there was only a single small loss. The maximum decline even up to a year later was minuscule on average, though five of them suffered drawdowns larger than -5%. Every signal saw a maximum gain of more than +15% within the following year.

When more than ten times as much volume flowed into advancing versus declining securities, returns were even more consistently positive.

If we combine both studies, the last couple of days has only a few precedents.

Breadth thrusts have been one of the most consistently reliable market developments for decades. Unfortunately, in 2022, we’ve seen several of them fail when they haven’t really before. That’s enough to be a bit suspect of ones triggering now. The last two days have surpassed prior thrusts this year and from a significantly lower level, so perhaps that will be enough to trigger more short-covering initially, then FOMO buying interest. It would be typical for stocks to back off over the next week, but we should not see materially lower prices if this thrust is going to hold.

I don’t mind being the party pooper when there seem to be good reasons to warn people. Of the 10 listed occurrences before 2016 (before QE was in full swing), 8 were when equity valuations were very attractive (average P/E of 9.7 and average Rule of 20 P/E of 14.2 or 29% below fair value). In the other 2 instances (1971 and 1987), valuations were fair (16.9 and 20.3) but inflation was going down and profits were rising.

David Rosenberg seeks to totally crash the party, noting that we have had 26 sessions with +2% advances or more this year.

We had 32 of these in 2008. We had 16 of them in 2001. Nine in 1990 and 12 in 1980. We had 19 of these whippy sessions in 1974, which was one of the worst years ever for the equity market — the year when thousands of brokers left Wall Street to drive a cab. In normal bull markets, we don’t tend to get many of these types of moves, which are purely short-covering rallies and little else. For example, we had the grand total of 3 such sessions in 2021 and just 2 of them in 2019 and both were fantastic years for the equity market. The number of times we have seen such dramatic rebounds in the context of recurring drawdowns to oversold levels is consistent with outright bear markets.

COVID State of Affairs: Oct 5 Here we go again.

The start of a new wave. Eyes are on Western Europe, as hospitalizations are uniformly increasing. As we’ve seen throughout the pandemic, some are hospitalized “with COVID19,” but it’s important to note that the Germany’s numbers are reported purely as “for COVID19.” In other words, not only are infections increasing, but so is severe disease.

Figure by Jean Fisch

Interestingly, no new subvariant is driving this wave, as the majority of cases are still the “old” BA.5 subvariant. This means changing weather, waning immunity, and/or changing behaviors are the culprit. (…)

This is concerning because subvariants are brewing. They only make up a small percentage of cases for now, but they are gaining ground; historically, we feel their impact when they make up ~30-50% of cases. These subvariants will eventually add fuel to the fire.

Currently, we have a “subvariant soup” on the horizon—a mix of many different Omicrons trying to dominate the space. Each subvariant has ~10% growth advantage over BA.5, meaning it has the ability to create a wave, but not a tsunami. (As a comparison, Alpha had a growth advantage of 7%/day; the first Omicron BA.1 had a growth advantage of 25%/day). (…)

Given the U.S. has mirrored European trends throughout the pandemic, a wave in the U.S. is likely coming.

Source: Pandem-ic

On a national level, SARS-CoV-2 wastewater has been decreasing the past two weeks, but that deceleration has started to level off. If we zoom in to specific jurisdictions, like Boston, there are concerning signals with sudden increases in viral wastewater levels. Wastewater will continue to be a huge asset moving forward as an early indicator of transmission in communities. (…)

If we combine five of the top new subvariant leaders in the U.S. (referred to as “Pentagon”), it’s clear that case acceleration is brewing below the surface. Given the current growth, we will likely see an impact on national metrics in mid-November.

The height of a U.S. wave is partially dependent on the number of people who get a fall booster. Unfortunately, it looks like the majority of Americans will be going into the winter ill-prepared. A new Kaiser Family Foundation survey found 40% of Americans are unsure if the booster is recommended for them, including about half of fully vaccinated rural residents (54%), Hispanic adults (51%), and those without a college degree (49%). There is clearly a failure of communication and outreach. This must be a priority as vaccines continue to protect against death, severe disease, transmission, cases, and long COVID-19. So far only 7.6 million Americans have received their fall booster.

We may be in for a bumpy ride this winter. SARS-CoV-2 is already gaining ground thanks to weather and behavior change. We expect growth to accelerate with subvariants on the horizon. There’s a lot you can do, but the lowest hanging fruit is to get your fall booster. Also, if you’re older and test positive, remember Paxlovid.

BTW:

@Sino_Market

• Long COVID reality (Axios)

Nearly 24 million U.S. adults have long COVID, and more than 80% of them have some trouble carrying out daily activities, the CDC says.

• Nearly 30% of adults previously infected with COVID reported having long COVID at some point.
• Up to 4 million people are estimated to be out of work because of long COVID symptoms, according to a Brookings report in August.

Nearly three years into a pandemic that has left millions newly disabled, medical researchers remain flummoxed about treating scary lingering symptoms, Axios’ Sabrina Moreno writes.

Long COVID symptoms can include shortness of breath, cognitive difficulties and symptoms that worsen even with minimal physical or mental effort — a primary indicator of chronic fatigue syndrome.

Long COVID is classified as a disability. But qualifying for Social Security benefits requires proof the condition has or will last a year — even though there’s no test to diagnose long COVID.

In a census survey last month, more than one in four adults with long COVID reported significant limitations on day-to-day activities.

The number jumps closer to 40% for respondents who are Black, Latino or disabled — three groups that shouldered outsized burdens throughout the pandemic.

The report confirms that people are developing long COVID symptoms regardless of age, race, gender or previous disability.

As winter months near, an expected rise in cases coupled with fewer COVID protections could mean millions more will get long COVID.

After Mar-a-Lago Search, Talk of ‘Civil War’ Is Flaring Online

Soon after the F.B.I. searched Donald J. Trump’s home in Florida for classified documents, online researchers zeroed in on a worrying trend.

Posts on Twitter that mentioned “civil war” had soared nearly 3,000 percent in just a few hours as Mr. Trump’s supporters blasted the action as a provocation. Similar spikes followed, including on Facebook, Reddit, Telegram, Parler, Gab and Truth Social, Mr. Trump’s social media platform. Mentions of the phrase more than doubled on radio programs and podcasts, as measured by Critical Mention, a media-tracking firm. (…)

While in many cases the term is used only loosely — shorthand for the nation’s intensifying partisan divisions — observers note that the phrase, for some, is far more than a metaphor.

Polling, social media studies and a rise in threats suggest that a growing number of Americans are anticipating, or even welcoming, the possibility of sustained political violence, researchers studying extremism say. What was once the subject of serious discussion only on the political periphery has migrated closer to the mainstream.

But while that trend is clear, there is far less agreement among experts about what it means. (…)

At a Trump rally in Michigan on Saturday night, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Republican from Georgia, said that “Democrats want Republicans dead,” adding that “Joe Biden has declared every freedom-loving American an enemy of the state.” At a recent fund-raiser, Michael T. Flynn, who briefly served as Mr. Trump’s national security adviser, said that governors had the power to declare war and that “we’re probably going to see that.” (…)

Experts say the steady pattern of bellicose talk has helped normalize the expectation of political violence. (…)