Gimme more stimmy Let me introduce you to a recurring theme for February economic data – the winter weather typical in the northeast made an appearance in the sunbelt during the month and the whole system went bananas. The weather impacted retail sales, which fell 3% for February after jumping 7.6% in January. Online shopping continued to boom and is up nearly 26% compared to last year while spending at restaurants and bars is still down about 17% compared to last year.  Moral of the story: The second round of stimmy made its way into checking accounts over the last week and retail sales are expected to rebound in March. Not…

Under control, for now February’s CPI reading indicated consumer prices (aka inflation) have increased 1.7% over the last year, which is up from the 1.4% figure reported just last month. Excluding energy and food, the core index only increased 1.3% for the year, which is actually slightly below last month’s reading at 1.4%. PPI, which measures inflation from the producer’s perspective, indicated prices were up 2.8% over the last year. This is the largest increase in the index we’ve seen since October 2018.  Moral of the story: A big part of the increase across both price indices last month was driven by the increase in gasoline prices (you’ve likely noticed gasoline prices increasing…

Waiting for the roaring twenties The manufacturing industry posted its ninth straight month of expansion in February as the ISM Manufacturing Index came in at 60.8, which is 2.1 points higher than January. Optimism across business leaders in the industry is increasing overall as demand is expanding. The services industries, which make up a much bigger part of the US economy today, hasn’t seen quite as smooth a recovery (you don’t need me to remind you that it’s been over a year since you’ve gone out for an appropriate celebration of brunch with friends on a Sunday). The ISM services index actually fell to its nine-month low in February. The…