Smart Investing Newsletter

After seeing headlines from several media outlets, I was worried May retail sales were slowing to a problem point, but I would say they actually looked quite strong. Compared to April, sales did fall 0.9%, which was larger than expectations for a 0.6% decline.

I remember using that same terminology back before the tech bust about 25 years ago. I was maybe a little bit early back then, but the house of cards collapsed. The more I read about alternative assets the more I scratch my head and ask how is Wall Street getting away with this?

Headline nonfarm payrolls increased 139k in the month of May, which was above the estimate of 125k, but below April’s reading of 147k. A big negative in the report was the fact that March and April saw negative revisions that caused payrolls in those month to decline by a combined 95k versus what was previously reported.

With the high cost of housing and higher interest rates, people trying to get their first home dropped to a record low around 23% in 2024. The average age of the first-time homebuyer has increased 10 years over the historical average to 38 years old.

Last week, Moody’s announced it downgraded the United States sovereign credit rating from AAA to Aa1. While a downgrade is important to understand and can have negative consequences for interest rates, this downgrade did not seem too problematic.