UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE WEEKLY CLAIMS
In the week ending December 5, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 853,000, an increase of 137,000 from the previous week’s revised level. The previous week’s level was revised up by 4,000 from 712,000 to 716,000. The 4-week moving average was 776,000, an increase of 35,500 from the previous week’s revised average. The previous week’s average was revised up by 1,000 from 739,500 to 740,500.
CPI for all items rises 0.2% in November as broad set of indexes increase Over the last 12 months, the all items index increased 1.2 percent before seasonal adjustment.
The index for all items less food and energy increased 0.2 percent in November after being unchanged the prior month. The index for all items less food and energy rose 1.6 percent over the last 12 months, also the same increase as the period ending October.
US reports 3,000 deaths in a single day for first time Daily tally exceeds number of victims from the September 11 terrorist attacks
CalculatedRisk has this chart showing the positivity rate reaching 14.4% yesterday. More tests = even more infections = more hospitalizations = …
- 73% in U.S. say coronavirus situation is getting worse, up 12 points
- 50%, up from 33%, worry about availability of hospital supplies, treatment
- 72% say lives disrupted by pandemic; 87% say it will last well into 2021
Covid-19 Relief Deal Delayed With Pelosi, McConnell Holding Back
- Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi have yet to engage in direct negotiations over the make-up of a new fiscal stimulus bill.
U.S. JOLTS: Job Opportunities Rate Improves But Hiring Rate Weakens
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that on the last business day of October, the total job openings rate improved to 4.5% from September’s 4.4%, revised from 4.3%. The openings rate is calculated as job openings as a percent of total employment plus jobs that have not yet been filled. The October figure remained below the 4.8% record in January 2019. The hiring rate eased to 4.1% from 4.2% in September, revised from 4.1%. The overall layoff and discharge rate rose to 1.2% and reversed declines during the prior two months. The quits rate held steady at an upwardly revised 2.2%, but remained below the record 2.4% in July of last year. These figures date back to December 2000.
The job openings level rose 2.4% to 6.652 million, down 9.0% y/y. The job openings level in the construction sector fell 29.2% y/y but in manufacturing, it rose 30.3% y/y. It fell by 18.9% y/y in leisure & hospitality but rose 2.8% y/y in the professional & business service sector. In government, the number of job openings declined 8.0% y/y.
In October, the level of hiring declined 1.3% (+1.0% y/y) to 5.812 million following a 1.1% September fall. The hiring rate of 4.1% was below the record 5.4% in May, but remained in the recovery’s up-trend. The private sector hiring rate edged lower to 4.5%. The government sector hiring rate improved to 1.5% after falling from 2.5% in August. The factory sector hiring rate eased to 3.0%, a three-month low. The leisure & hospitality rate rose to 8.1% from 8.0%. The professional & business service sector hiring rate declined to 5.3%, down from 6.0% in June, and the education & health services hiring rate improved to 3.2% from 3.0% one year earlier.
- 6.7 million open jobs, but roughly 10.9 million people considered unemployed.
Data: FRED; Chart: Axios Visuals
Smartphone shipments in China fall 17% in November on year Domestic smartphone shipments in China plunged 17% in November from a year earlier, extending a run of double-digit declines in the world’s largest phone market, government data released on Thursday showed.
(…) Phone makers shipped 27 million handsets to domestic customers in October compared with 33 million a year earlier, according to the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology (CAICT), a state-backed think-tank.
That follows a 27% year-on-year decline in October and a 36% decline in September.
Data from third-party research firms showed that Apple and Huawei Technologies Co Ltd saw shipments decline in the third quarter on-year, even though both companies released new flagship handsets in October. (…)
Chinese Chip Maker in Default on $2.5 Billion of Dollar Bonds Tsinghua Unigroup, a key player in China’s push for self-reliance in semiconductors, is in default on nearly $2.5 billion of international bonds, in the latest instance of financial stress in China spilling over into global markets.
(…) The missed payments come as China’s central and local governments become more selective in bailing out ailing borrowers, both at home and abroad. Some analysts and investors believe authorities are pushing forward with a campaign to clear out unviable companies and dispel the idea that government-backed companies’ creditors will always be made whole.
Last month, Tsinghua Unigroup defaulted on a privately placed domestic bond worth 1.3 billion yuan, or the equivalent of $199 million. Alongside defaults by a major coal company and the parent of BMW AG’s Chinese joint-venture partner, it unsettled participants in China’s bond markets. (…)
This would be the 17th dollar bond default by a Chinese corporate borrower in 2020, up from nine last year, according to ANZ credit-strategy head Owen Gallimore, who put the face value of this year’s defaulted Chinese dollar debt at $12 billion.
Measured by outstanding face value, that equates to 7% of dollar bonds in a Bloomberg Barclays index of Chinese high-yield debt, he said, and spans state-linked companies, property developers, and private industrial businesses. (…)
A Chinese WeWork for Apartments Is in Distress, Leaving Renters Out in the Cold
Vaccines Herald Return to Offices, But Workers Don’t Want to Go
More than half of U.S. employees currently working from home say they’d like to keep their remote arrangements beyond the pandemic, according to a Pew Research Center survey released Wednesday.
One-third of those surveyed said they want the option to telework at least sometimes. Only 11% said they ‘rarely or never’ want to work from home, according to Pew’s October survey of almost 6,000 U.S. adults. (…)
A recent University of Chicago survey found similar results. Employees viewed working from home as a perk for which they were potentially willing to trade as much as 8% of their salaries. The study concluded that remote work following the pandemic could raise productivity as much as 2.4%, according to the paper released Dec. 2.
Its survey of 15,000 Americans “reveals that the experience has been positive and better than expected for the majority of firms and workers.” (…)
Similarly, the University of Chicago paper said 70% of its survey respondents expressed a reluctance to return to some pre-pandemic activities even when a vaccine for Covid-19 becomes widely available — specifically riding subways and crowded elevators, or dining indoors at restaurants. (…)
Manhattan apartments haven’t been this cheap to rent in 10 years. The median rental price plummeted 22% in November from a year earlier to $2,743 a month, according to Miller Samuel and Douglas Elliman. (Bloomberg)
U.S. home prices march upward Middle-income housing across America — particularly in big coastal cities — is growing scarcer than ever, as the wealthy bid up properties that might once have been considered “affordable.”
(…) The last five months have seen a real estate frenzy. Even as many Americans have struggled to pay rents and mortgages, the wealthy have paid above-asking prices for homes that used to be worth a lot less — leaving the low end of the market hollow. From there, a chain reaction keeps low and middle-income people in rentals and leaves fewer financial incentives for developers to build anything but high-end homes. (…) “In terms of the relationship between people’s incomes rising and home prices rising, we are at a historical lack of synchronicity.” (…)
Lumber Touches Record With Lockdowns Spurring Renovation Revival
U.S. futures touched $649.40 per 1,000 board feet on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange on Friday. On an intraday basis, that’s the highest since at least 1986, when Bloomberg records begin. Prices have more than doubled since April amid tightening supply, outpacing returns from havens such as gold and silver.
“Inventories are still extremely low,” said RBC Capital Markets analyst Paul Quinn, noting prices are poised to climb higher. (…)
Axios adds:
- The National Association of Home Builders estimated earlier this year the spike in lumber prices increased the price of a single-family home by over $16,000. (…)
- Lumber (and wood) is the most reported material shortage among commercial contractors — and the problem is getting worse.
- One in 3 contractors say they don’t have enough — up 20 percentage points from last quarter, according to survey results from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Commercial Construction Index, first provided to Axios.
Data: FactSet; Chart: Axios Visuals
Home-Lending Surge Puts Mortgage Market on Pace for Record Year
Americans are poised to take out more mortgages this year than they did even during the run-up to the 2008-09 financial crisis.
In the first nine months of the year, lenders extended $2.8 trillion of mortgages, according to industry-research firm Inside Mortgage Finance. The boom has extended into the final quarter of 2020, prompting analysts to predict origination volume will exceed the prior record of $3.7 trillion in 2003. (…)
The pandemic has (…) ushered in record-low interest rates that prompted millions to refinance and lower their monthly payments or trim the length of their loans. (…)
In the first three quarters of 2020, refis made up 65% of all originations, on pace to be the highest share since 2012, according to Inside Mortgage Finance. (…)
ECB: Recalibration, no stepping up of stimulus
The ECB just announced a set of new policy measures. These announcements all fall into the category “recalibration” and not “additional easing”. Here are the main elements of what the ECB just announced:
- Pandemic Emergency Purchase Programme: The ECB’s emergency quantitative easing programme will be increased by €500 billion to a total of €1.85 trillion, to ensure that net purchases will last at least until March 2022.
- Reinvestments: The reinvestments of the principal payments from the PEPP purchases will run at least until the end of 2023.
- Asset Purchase Programme: The ECB’s ‘traditional’ QE programme to bring inflation back to target continues to run at €20bn per month, open-ended.
- Pandemic emergency longer-term refinancing operations (PELTROs): The ECB’s emergency funding scheme will be continued into 2021.
- Targeted longer-term refinancing operations (TLTROs): The ECB’s funding-for-lending scheme will be extended by 12 months until June 2022, and the amount banks can get from the ECB was increased to 55% of the eligible loan stock, from 50%.
- Collateral: The easing of collateral rules was extended in line with the extension of the TLTROs until June 2022.
UP, UP And …
Airbnb Prices IPO at $68 a Share, Higher Than Expected Range The pricing sets the Airbnb’s valuation at about $47 billion, marking the latest sign of exuberance in the IPO market and a key milestone in the company’s turnaround.
DoorDash’s IPO Delivers as Shares Surge in Market Debut DoorDash’s stock price jumped 86% on its first day of trading, valuing the food deliverer at more than $70 billion, higher than many of the restaurant clients it serves.
(…) For the quarter ended Sept. 30, DoorDash reported a loss of $43 million on $879 million in revenue, compared with a loss of $152 million on $239 million in revenue for the year-earlier period.
Interesting comp:
And software maker C3.ai climbed as much as 174% in its first day of trading.
Obviously strong demand for equities. But supply is trying to catch up:
Data: Dealogic; Chart: Naema Ahmed/Axios
Meanwhile
Sunday deadline set for ‘firm decision’ on Brexit talks Deadlock in Brussels after ‘frank’ three-hour Johnson-Von der Leyen meeting
Facebook Hit by Antitrust Suits From FTC, States The Federal Trade Commission and a bipartisan group of state attorneys general brought broad antitrust allegations against the social-media giant, accusing it of a years long campaign to buy up or freeze out potential rivals.
(…) The agency also accused the Menlo Park, Calif.-based company of anticompetitive conduct in how third-party apps access information from Facebook. In the lawsuit the FTC said the company made certain application programming interfaces, or APIs, available to third-party apps only if they refrained from providing core functions similar to what Facebook offered. (…)
The FTC is calling for the court to require Facebook to divest some of its businesses to restore competition and require the company to provide support or services to the separated operations. It also wants to require the social-media company to gain regulatory approval for future acquisitions and not impose conditions on accessing its APIs and data that are aimed at restricting competition. (…)
