New GDP Calculation taking effect

If you recall my article on the newly invented way of calculating GDP, well we are at that point now.

Today, the new GDP numbers (including legal bills, art, music, theatre and imaginary pension funds) were in effect. Real GDP grew 1.7% on an annualized basis in the second quarter of 2013.

As you can see, the old nominal GDP numbers (red chart) and the new nominal GDP numbers (green chart) are about 3% different from each other. 

Nominal GDP

With these new numbers in place, my zero hour debt chart is being reformed to this.

You can see the large drop there, meaning that debt has actually dropped due to the debt limit.

Zero Hour Debt

Second, with these new GDP numbers, the debt to GDP ratio has declined by 3%. It isn't 105% anymore, but is now 105/(100+3) = 102%.

Good work in fudging the numbers, Ben.

(also note that stocks are now seemingly 3% less overvalued)

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COMEX stock touches new lows

And we have new lows this week. Total gold stock goes to 6989165 troy ounces.

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Single Family Housing Starts Vs. Unemployment Rate

One of the key metrics for the health in the housing market are the "privately owned housing starts". "Housing starts" are an economic indicator that reflect the number of privately owned new houses (technically housing units) on which construction has been started in a given period. Usually, a decline in the "housing starts" leads to the start of a recession. 

The "housing starts" are a leading indicator for the unemployment rate. Both metrics are inversely correlated. When the "housing starts" drop, the unemployment rate will rise with a lag of about 1 to 2 years.

Because of the fact that the "housing starts" are a leading indicator, this is a very important metric to predict the unemployment rate. As a consequence, the "housing starts" are also a predictor of real GDP, capacity utilization, the stock market index and the consumer price index (CPI).

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Correlation: Employment-Population Ratio Vs. Real GDP per Capita

I like statistics that can't be fudged by the government and this is one of them: The Civilian Employment-Population Ratio. This measure is one of the best to evaluate the labor market. Each time when this ratio declines, we enter a recession. So this is a very good gauge in predicting bad periods in the overall economy.

A high ratio (above 70%) means that a lot of people are employed and this will result in a high GDP per capita. A low ratio (under 50%) is considered bad for GDP.

If we take a look at the percentage change per annum, we see that the trend for the employment-population ratio is down (blue chart). So the employment picture isn't improving and this translates into a declining real GDP per capita growth rate (red chart).

As Karl Denninger explains, the amount of employed people as a percentage of the population hasn't improved since 2008. So the economy hasn't recovered a lot.

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Copper goes into backwardation

As gold went into backwardation, now also copper starts going into backwardation.

We should see some upside in copper following this move into backwardation. But as opposed to gold, backwardation in copper isn't a good sign for the copper price. Meaning, if we see too much backwardation in copper (red curve making a bottom), you should expect a top in the copper price.

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COMEX less than 1 million ounces physical gold left

We're getting closer to the zero line...

At this pace we will have the unthinkable "event" at the end of this month.

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Consumer Price Index: The effect of a rise in oil prices

With crude oil going back over $106/barrel (which is a 20% increase from $90/barrel), let's see how the CPI would do.

As you know, the consumer price index consists mostly of housing (42%), then second comes transportation (17%) and last comes food (15%).

The crude oil is part of the transportation segment. One third of the transportation segment is motor fuel or 5% of the CPI.

So if oil prices go up 20%, the CPI will only go up 20% x 5% = 1%. 

More importantly, housing determines a major part of the CPI.  Half of the housing segment consists of Owners’ equivalent rent of residences which is basically the amount of rent you would pay for staying in the house. This depends on the housing prices. 10% of the housing segment is fuel and utilities. So if oil goes up 20%, the housing segment will go up 10% x 20% = 2%. And the CPI would go up 2% x 40% = 1%.

CPI

So basically, if oil prices go up 20%, the CPI at least goes up 2% from the fuel in the housing and transportation segments (if all else stays equal). The other segments will of course be influenced too by rising oil prices, but to a lesser extent.

So that's the significance of the oil price on the CPI.

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