Stuck in a rut  New unemployment claims barely fell last week and seem to be stuck above the 400k level. This is the second week in a row that unemployment claims have not trended lower as we would hope, and could indicate potential stress in the labor market continuing despite the economy reopening.  Moral of the story: Job openings are at record levels as employers are desperately looking for more workers, but I don’t anticipate the unemployment picture will change meaningfully until the fall, when kids start going back to school and the elevated federal unemployment benefits run out. At this point, just feels like a broken record… Can’t stop…

Apparently no biggie The consumer price index, which measures price inflation for a basket of consumer goods, increased 5% in May, ahead of expectations for a 4.7% increase. This is the sharpest increase in annual inflation we’ve seen since the summer of 2008, just before the US went into the Great Financial Crisis. Core inflation, which excludes food and energy, increased 3.8%, which is the biggest jump we’ve seen in this measure since May 1992, that was literally before I was born.  Moral of the story: Markets pretty much ignored this report as the consensus seems to be that the elevated inflation is transitory in nature and should pass in the…

Below expectations  The US added 559k new jobs in May, short of expectations for 671k new jobs. The leisure and hospitality once again led job gains in May with 292k new jobs, followed by the education and health and government sectors. There was, unsurprisingly, a decrease in construction jobs last month as we’ve seen the rising construction costs put a slight damper on the construction market. Overall, the unemployment rate fell to 5.8%, the lowest so far in the pandemic, but that number doesn’t account for those who left the workforce as a result of the pandemic and are likely to return.  Moral of the story: Employers are eager to…