A Quick Economic Note

Every day important data on the state of the economy is released.  Yesterday there was a 30 year Treasury bond auction that wasn’t a disaster, but it was a relatively small auction, around $20 billion.  Today the producer price inflation index showed a much higher price rise than expected.  Those producer prices soon flow into consumer prices.  Bond yields are going higher today because of this.  Goofy unemployment claims data was released.  Credit card delinquencies continue to rise, both in number of people and amount overdue.  Retail sales were below expectations for February and revised January sales, as always for Bidementia for revisions, actually declined, which is likely related to both inflation and the credit card issues.  So things aren’t really good and sooner or later the official statistic generators will be unable to hide the scope of the problem.