The Sunshine State takes the gold once again! Florida is #1 in the nation for mortgage fraud cases. So, not saying anything bad about my competition, but if you decide to seek financing from someone you don’t necessarily know and trust it may not end well.
Which is why you have such a trustworthy and handsome guy like me to handle all of that for you.
So the Gulf of Mexico is bleeding oil. Lots and lots of oil. Enough to get Obama to put a temporary hiatus on his offshore drilling expansion. I expect this to move oil prices up. And, since every product in creation needs to be shipped in some form or fashion, expect that added gas cost to trickle down to higher consumer prices. Because you and I are supposed to pay for all the world’s problems. Fun.
Greece received it’s much needed bailout from the European Union and the International Monetary Fund. The price tag is 110 billion Euros (approximately $146 billion) with 28% of the cash coming from Germany. This also means that the IMF and the EU get to start calling the shots as far as the allocation of those funds goes. And the Greek population is not entirely thrilled with the idea of being told what to do with their resources.
So, of course, a lot of them did the only logical thing they could do: they took to the streets and rioted. Which reminds us of the wise axiom “When in doubt, grab a sledgehammer and deface some poor shmo’s business.” Awesome, guys. Very patriotic.
On the home front, closed home sales soared upwards 26.9% (measured by closed transactions) which represents the biggest percentage increase in that metric since 1963. To be fair, it was coming off of a very low point, but regardless I’m a big fan of this trend. It brings hope that the housing turnaround is starting to catch some serious tread which is good news for home prices.
Gross Domestic Product in the 1st quarter of 2010 moved up 3.2% on an annualized basis, softening from the 5.6% growth we saw in 4th quarter 2009. However, these days a plus is a plus and I’ll take it.
Okay okay okay. So the numbers that are coming in lately are good. I don’t think anyone’s arguing that. Stocks are positive, growth is good, jobs are starting to grow again, etc. The question we need to be asking ourselves right now is ‘what are these numbers really worth amidst all of this stimulus-fueled noise?’ Our government has taken so many extreme and unconventional actions in stimulating our economy that the statistics we observe to gauge our progress may be massively upwardly biased.
Put another way, just because you’re energetic after 17 Red Bulls doesn’t mean you are a naturally energetic person.
So, I am thinking the next couple of quarters will be particularly indicative of the legitimate healing that has taken place in our economy. The Fed has closed all but one of the specialty financing programs they rolled out to combat the liquidity crunch of 2008. Aside from interest rates being held at a low level, America is slowly coming off of financial life-support.
Let’s hope her ticker can keep on tickin’ by itself.
