In my 3/15 post I commented on the decline in Newspaper Ads - http://thorstenconsulting.com/serendipity/index.php?/archives/161-Newspaper-Ads-Sag-Industrial-Production-Shows-Bleak-Trend.html
This morning the SFGATE chronicled the continuing decline in Newspaper Ads bit.ly/lKDsur
Circulation fell at most of the largest U.S. newspapers compared with a year ago, despite new rules that give publishers more flexibility to boost their totals.
The figures released Tuesday, for the six months ending in March, mark the first time that newspapers have calculated circulation under the looser guidelines from the Audit Bureau of Circulations.
Among other things, the changes allow publishers to include free copies given to newspaper employees and local schools; before copies had to be bought to be counted. The changes also make it easier for newspapers to lump separate editions under different titles into one total.
Newspaper circulation has been falling as readers shift from the printed newspaper to free websites and mobile services. The electronic alternatives have become even more tempting as newspapers charge more for their print editions. Some of the falling circulation stemmed from publishers' decisions to shrink their delivery areas to save money.
Circulation is important because it affects advertising rates. Print advertising has long been the main source of revenue for newspapers, but it has been falling because of the uncertain economy and a shift by advertisers to free and cheaper options on the Internet.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2011/05/03/state/n163417D52.DTL#ixzz1LO3YRYjy
Kimberly-Clark Posts Softer 1Q Profit, Will Raise Prices (Source: http://fxn.ws/ez8Q70) FOXBusiness By Matt Egan Published April 25, 2011
CHICAGO – Kimberly-Clark (KMB) suffered a steeper-than-expected 8.9% slide in first-quarter profits as the maker of Kleenex tissues grappled with higher prices.
“We continue to execute our global business plan strategies in a difficult environment,” CEO Thomas Falk said in a statement.
Kimberly-Clark announced plans to raise prices in a “number” of its businesses, including North American consumer products.
“The rapid run-up in commodity costs has influenced our near-term profitability, so we are taking aggressive actions in response to the cost environment,” Falk said.
In light of the higher prices, Kimberly-Clark lowered its 2011 non-GAAP EPS forecast to $4.80 to $5.05, compared with $4.90 to $5.05 previously. Yet the company now sees full-year sales rising 4% to 6%, up from 3% to 4% previously. Organic sales are expected to rise 2% to 4%.
Shareholders punished Kimberly-Clark for the earnings miss and new guidance, sending the stock down 3.1% to $64.00 ahead of Monday’s open. The company’s shares finished last week up nearly 5% on the year.
Read more: http://www.foxbusiness.com/industries/2011/04/25/kimberly-clark-posts-lower-profit-says-raise-prices/#ixzz1KXjPHFVH
Thor's Hammer Note: Inflationary pressures continue to build throughout the economy. The thought of inflation was laughed at a couple of years ago and now it is impossible to read current news articles without noting some reference to the inflation spectre. Expect continued price increases in all of our daily expenses. Also expect to see confusion on the part of politicians as they struggle with an issue that they have contributed to. We are in trouble folks ...
© 2011 - Jim Lindell
From Finance.yahoo.com http://yhoo.it/dE3QNd
Newspaper ads sag to a 25-year low in 2010.
Newspaper advertising falls to lowest level since 1985 despite gradual easing of 4-year slump
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) -- Newspaper advertising in the U.S. has sunk to a 25-year low as marketing budgets followed readers to the Internet, where advertising is far cheaper than what publishers have been able to command in print.
Advertisers spent $25.8 billion on newspapers' print and digital editions last year, according to figures released Tuesday by the Newspaper Association of America. That's the lowest amount since 1985 when total newspaper advertising stood at $25.2 billion.
After adjusting for inflation, newspaper advertising now stands at about the same level as nearly 50 years ago. In 1962, newspaper advertising totaled $3.7 billion, which translates to about $26 billion today.
Author's Note: Many times the public stories of a changing industry can be easily seen in the underlying data. The data for the chart comes from the Federal Reserve. Note how each of the years are a continuous decline. Also note that 2011 starts off lower than the preceding years on the chart. This chart shows no sign of changing course. The Newspaper industry is in dire straits.
© 2011 Jim Lindell - Thorsten Consulting Group, Inc.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-03-10/americans-in-poll-show-little-confidence-with-plurality-perceiving-decline.html
From Bloomberg – Selzer and Co. conducted a poll in March of 2011. “There seems to be something of a disconnect between what people are feeling and what people are doing,” says J. Ann Selzer.
The gloomy outlook contradicts economic data showing the economy on the mend, and responses that question if the recession truly ended in June 2009.
1 American in 7 has faith a lasting economic recovery has taken hold and a plurality say they are personally worse off than they were two years ago.
Almost half of the respondents believe the U.S. is in a “fragile” rebound and could fall back into recession.
More than a third of the country believes the U.S. never emerged from recession.
Sixty-three percent of Americans say the nation is on the wrong track, which was the lowest in the national mood in the one and a half years the Bloomberg poll has been conducted.
Almost half of poll respondents say they are personally worse off than they were two years ago, when the country was losing 796,000 jobs a month and the economy was shrinking at a 4.9 percent annual rate. The stock market hit its post-financial crisis low two years ago yesterday.
While the 8.9 percent unemployment rate in February is the lowest in 22 months, American workers have been slow to make up lost ground. Only 1.3 million U.S. jobs have been regained of the more than 8.7 million lost since January 2008.
Bloomberg reporters on this story: Mike Dorning; Jonathan D. Salant
Note that the U-3 (official unemployment) dropped to 9.4% from 9.8%. The U-6 dropped to 16.7% from 17.0%. These are good signs for the economy. Let us only hope that we do not see this disappear when the January #’s come out at the beginning of Feb. If you have never followed this data, you can access it before you see it in print or before it is read on the newswire at http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf
The U-3 number is the rate that everyone talks about in the paper or in the media. It was well into the recession before people started discussing the U-6 rate which represents all unemployment. By the way, the BLS #’s do not include the long term discouraged workers over 12 months. Overall unemployment is actually over 21%. If you have not had exposure to this last piece of info, I would suggest visiting http://www.shadowstats.com.
From the Drudgereport.com
VIDEO: Crazed shoppers stampede at TARGET...
Marine stabbed at BEST BUY...
Shopper arrested after packing gun in belt; knives, 'pepper grenade'...
Mall food court placed on lockdown after fight, reports of gunshots...
Shopper arrested after cutting in line, raging...
Police called after 'thousands' rush TOYS R US...
Woman busted after gun threat at toy store...
Shoppers accuse WAL-MART of false advertising...
The above stories can be accessed from Drudge. We are reaching an extremely sad place in society when we:
1) stay up all night just to spend money
2) disrespect one another for the sake of acquiring material possessions
3) threaten one another over shopping AND finally
4) seriously injure one another for material goods.
We haven't learned our lessons from the current recession to understand what is truly important to us. The "joy" of material goods is extremely short lived. As they say on the FOX Football show "Come On Man!"
(c) 2010 - Jim Lindell
One of the key signs to the economy recovering will be the return of jobs for the unemployed. Since the economy is driven by the consumer, the consumer must have funds (i.e. jobs) to fuel the recovery. The following graph is from http://calcualtedriskblog.com. Note that the previous 11 recessions have followed a similar pattern in terms of job recovery. Unfortunately, the length of time to return to pre-recession job levels in each of the recessions has been getting longer. Also remember that the 2001 recession was known as a jobless recovery. If the trend continues, it does not bode well for the return of jobs. Based on the chart, it does not appear that we will return to pre-recession employment levels for at least a couple of years in the best circumstances. Investors Business Daily used the same information and predicted that the jobs would not return to the same levels until March of 2020. Keep tight reins on your costs. Contrary to the NBER's declaration, we are not out of the recession. © Jim Lindell 2010
Cities Face a Deepening Fiscal Crisis
By Steven Malanga
Source:http://bit.ly/964a36
A recent study of the 77 largest municipal pension systems by finance professors Joshua Rauh of Northwestern University's Kellogg School and Robert Novy-Marx of the University of Rochester estimates that total unfunded liabilities of America's municipal pension systems is well north of half a trillion dollars. On a per capita basis, the professors estimated that each household in the 50 largest cities and counties they studied owes an average of $14,165 for future retiree liabilities. This, of course, is in addition to the other debt these places owe, most especially their municipal debt. New York City taxpayers, for instance, owe about $65 billion of municipal debt on top of what Rauh and Novy-Marx estimate is $122 billion in unfunded pension obligations.....
The city with the highest per household unfunded liability in the nation is Chicago, $41,966 per household, or $45 billion in total obligations....
California is in particularly bad shape. San Francisco and Los Angeles are among the places with the greatest liabilities among cities, amounting to $34,940 and $18,643 per household, respectively....
The implications for taxpayers are staggering as well as retirees. this will force many municipalities to file bankruptcy to try and obtain some relief from the obligations. This does not have a happy ending.
(Source: http://www.newyorkfed.org/survey/empire/empiresurvey_overview.html)
The Empire State Manufacturing Survey indicates that conditions deteriorated in November for New York State manufacturers. For the first time since mid-2009, the general business conditions index fell below zero, declining 27 points to -11.1. The new orders index plummeted 37 points to -24.4, and the shipments index also fell below zero. The indexes for both prices paid and prices received declined, with the latter falling into negative territory. The index for number of employees remained above zero but was well below its October level, and the average workweek index dropped to -13.0. Future indexes generally climbed, suggesting that conditions were expected to improve in the months ahead, although the capital spending and technology spending indexes inched lower.
Wisdom is there if we only choose to see it. Please read the following quote from Bobby Kennedy on what the Gross National Product means and more importantly what it does not mean. Too bad more people don't understand these concepts...
"Too much and too long, we seem to have surrendered community excellence and community values in the mere accumulation of material things. Our gross national product ... if we should judge America by that - counts air pollution and cigarette advertising, and ambulances to clear our highways of carnage. It counts special locks for our doors and the jails for those who break them. It counts the destruction of our redwoods and the loss of our natural wonder in chaotic sprawl. It counts napalm and the cost of a nuclear warhead, and armored cars for police who fight riots in our streets. It counts Whitman's rifle and Speck's knife, and the television programs which glorify violence in order to sell toys to our children.
"Yet the gross national product does not allow for the health of our children, the quality of their education, or the joy of their play. It does not include the beauty of our poetry or the strength of our marriages; the intelligence of our public debate or the integrity of our public officials. It measures neither our wit nor our courage; neither our wisdom nor our learning; neither our compassion nor our devotion to our country; it measures everything, in short, except that which makes life worthwhile. And it tells us everything about America except why we are proud that we are Americans."
Robert F. Kennedy Address, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, March 18, 1968
I just saw this graph from the market ticker (source: http://market-ticker.org/). Note the drop off in the employment rate. Specifically compare the timeframe from 2006 forward and then refer to my previous post re: Appliances, Furniture and Carpeting. Do you see the same slope? Our economy which is purportedly driven by the consumer (70%), is being impacted by the lack of employment. The lack of employment translates into a lack of disposable funds and results in decreased consumption. We need jobs for our country!
(c) 2010 - Jim Lindell
The Industrial Production for Appliances, Furniture and Carpeting (Seasonally Adjusted) shows continuing decreases. This trend is dependent on the housing industry. As the housing industry continues to be depressed, the related industries will also experience difficult times. We are also moving to the slower housing time of the year. Expect these industries to remain depressed. (c) 2010 - Jim Lindell
INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION AND CAPACITY UTILIZATION (source: http://www.federalreserve.gov/releases/g17/Current/)
Industrial production decreased 0.2 percent in September after having increased 0.2 percent in August. The indexes both for manufacturing and for manufacturing excluding motor vehicles and parts also moved down 0.2 percent in September. Production at mines moved up 0.7 percent, while the output of utilities fell 1.9 percent. For the third quarter as a whole, total industrial production rose at an annual rate of 4.8 percent after having advanced about 7 percent in both the first and second quarters of this year. The index for manufacturing decelerated sharply in the third quarter: After having jumped at an annual rate of 9.1 percent in the second quarter, factory output gained 3.6 percent in the third quarter. At 93.2 percent of its 2007 average, total industrial production in September was 5.4 percent above its year-earlier level. The capacity utilization rate for total industry edged down to 74.7 percent, a rate 4.2 percentage points above the rate from a year earlier but 5.9 percentage points below its average from 1972 to 2009.
|