🚨Senate hearing for Treasury Secretary nominee Scott Bessent is live - this is arguably Trump's most important pick given the precarious state of federal finances

Here we go... 🧵 Chairman Crapo praises Bessent in opening statement, citing Bessent's track record in the financial sector, Ivy League education, adjunct professorship

Crapo also alludes to Trump's promises of a Golden Era and the role Bessent will play in that

For convenience, here's all the info on the Mar jobs report in a single thread - sorry to be the bearer of bad news, especially regarding American citizens losing so much ground in this economy... The headline numbers once again look good w/ over 300k payrolls added and the employment number from the household survey rising even faster, but what kinds of jobs are being created? Turns out they're all part-time:

Here's the CPI🧵 on today's dumpster fire of a report - hint: inflation isn't dead, you're $6,800 poorer b/c of it, and it's poised to get much worse next year... First, the headlines:
CPI rose 0.3% M/M, 3.1% Y/Y
Core (ex- food and energy) rose 0.4% M/M, 3.9% Y/Y
Team Transitory™️ has egg on their face for the thousandth time: we haven't been trending toward 2% but 3% - we're there and there's no indication we're going lower:

Jan jobs report🧵- here's what you need to know that the talking heads and gov't statisticians won't tell you, including why the real unemployment rate is btwn 6.3% and 7.4%... First the headlines:
Nonfarm payrolls rose 353k last month
Unemployment rate steady at 3.7% (more on that later)
Note that updates to the BLS' data make it difficult to compare Jan '24 to prior months, so this monthly change needs an important qualifier...

https://x.com/RealEJAntoni/status/1753416226812948683?s=20

Dec CPI 🧵...
Inflation rips the stake out of its chest, looses a blood-chilling scream, and tells the Fed it's ready for another round; real weekly earnings are down 4.5% since Jan '21 and things are poised to get worse... First, the headlines:
CPI up 0.3% M/M and 3.4% Y/Y
Core CPI (excludes volatile food & energy) up 0.3% M/M and 3.9% Y/Y
For all the talk of "disinflation," no one seems to have been paying attention to the trend that clearly shows us approaching 3%+ and not the 2% target...

Dec jobs report 🧵: there's SO much bad news under the hood of this report, including the economy shedding 1.5 million full-time jobs in a single month, big downward revisions, and a true unemployment rate between 6.4% and 7.5% - here's the truth you should know... First, the headlines: nonfarm payrolls rose 216k on the backs of big downward revisions to previous months and unemployment rate remained unchanged at 3.7% - let's delve into why that rate is so low (hint: 676k people left the labor force in Dec)...

Another round of very mixed data, but in line w/ recession early next year - here's a plan English, deep dive 🧵 on the Nov jobs report, including why the unemployment rate is much higher than the official number: First, headlines: nonfarm payrolls up 199k, as jobs "increased in manufacturing, reflecting
the return of workers from a strike" exactly as expected; unemployment rate down to 3.7% amid surge in household survey employment (seasonal adj problem?)...

https://twitter.com/RealEJAntoni/status/1732960769384263965

Short 🧵 on the money supply: M2 fell a mere 0.1% M/M in Oct and remains $3 trillion above its pre-pandemic trend; M2 is not "collapsing" as some are claiming: Looking at the weekly figures shows that M2 has moved sideways since mid Apr '23 and is down just 6.0% from all-time record in Apr '22; it's still 35.2% above pre-pandemic level; we have a long way to go in this inflationary cycle:

Here's a plain-English 🧵 on the Oct CPI report, including how the typical American family has lost the equivalent of $7,400 in annual pay since Jan '21; oh, and get ready for the most expensive Thanksgiving ever - Turkey isn't the only thing burning this year... First, the headlines:
CPI components were mixed for the month with net change less than 0.1% since Sep; index is up 3.2% Y/Y while core (excludes food and energy) is up 4.0%, twice the Fed's alleged 2% target, but no one believes them anymore...

Here's a plain-English 🧵 on the Oct jobs report, that not only points to recession, but that something is seriously wrong w/ BLS' initial data, and it needs to be taken with a BIG grain of salt... First, the headlines:
Establishment survey gained 150k
Household survey LOST 348k, that's the biggest drop since Apr '20 (covid lockdown); it's an unprecedented divergence btwn the 2 surveys; BLS' firm birth/death model added 412k jobs in Oct that likely don't exist:

Here's a plain English thread on the latest GDP numbers and why this is totally unsustainable - oh yeah, and inflation's not dead...🧵 Real GDP jumped 4.9% in the third quarter, but what's fueling the rise vs. what's not growing speaks volumes about the economy's trajectory - the key driver of economy growth, real private fixed investment, is flat since Q1 '22:

Sep CPI comes in hot, as forecasted, w/ no sign inflation is going away; typical American family effectively $7,300 poorer compared to Jan '21🧵...
CPI 3.7% Y/Y and 0.4% M/M

https://twitter.com/RealEJAntoni/status/1712094316712104180

Since Jan '21, prices are up 17.1% on average, w/ many consumer staples up much more - energy prices are devastating consumers, prices up 23%-77%...

Latest Jobs Report looks good w/ headline numbers blowing away expectations, but the devil is in the details - here's a plain-English thread on why this is a very troubling report🧵... First the headlines:
Sep nonfarm payrolls jump 336k; Unemployment rate flat at 3.8%; Labor force participation rate remains depressed at 62.8%; Those not in the labor force rose to roughly 5 million more than pre-pandemic - this is artificially pushing down unemployment rate:

Unwinding of the balance sheet continues; repayment of FDIC and other emergency loans is bringing total assets down faster ($46B) than total securities ($28B) but will still take quite a while to return to "normal" which means serious losses at the Fed are going to continue... Here's what those losses look like: over $100 billion and counting; they managed to lose money despite having a money printer...

Hot CPI numbers as expected - inflation accelerated again in Aug; here’s a plain-English, deep dive thread explaining the real-life impact of inflation 🧵... First the headlines: 3.7% increase in CPI and 4.3% increase in core CPI, over twice the 2% target; monthly CPI rose 0.6%, hottest monthly reading in 14 months, an annualized rate of 7.8% - at that pace, prices double every 9.2 years:

For Labor Day, here's a plain English overview of America's labor market, context of where we are (including an alternative unemployment rate), and where we're headed 🧵... Job openings (proxy for labor demand) have plummeted and previous levels revised down, level now below pre-pandemic trend for 1st time since Mar '21; job opening rate also below pre-pandemic trend too; lower demand means lower price (wages), implying slower wage growth:

Terrible numbers in Aug #JobsReport and it gets worse with the increasingly suspicious "revisions"...
Here's a deep-dive, plain English 🧵 with what you need to know... First, the headlines: 187k nonfarm payrolls added as unemployment rate climbs to 3.8%
But last two months just lost 110k jobs in downward revisions - meaning 59% of the jobs "gained" in Aug were jobs we thought we already had:

Today's CPI print is further confirmation 3% inflation is the new normal - very troubling data being ignored while celebrating retreat from 40-year high inflation...🧵 First some important context: annual inflation has outpaced weekly earnings growth for 26 of last 30 months as people pay hidden tax of inflation:

#JobsReport for Jun is lackluster and contains #recession indicators...
209k payrolls added - lowest in 2 and a half yrs
Unemployment rate: 3.6%, up 0.2% YTD 452k additional part-time jobs from economic reasons:
“partially reflecting an increase in the number of persons whose hours were cut due to slack work or business conditions..."
More people are trying to get full-time jobs at same time businesses are cutting them...

What is #Bidenomics? In a word, failure. Talking points aside, here's a thread of nothing but the facts on how the American people have been impacted... Inflation went from 1.4% under Biden to 40-year highs, and remains "sticky" i.e., not going away; it has risen faster than wages for the last 26 months - a record; so your paycheck is bigger but buys less...

From NY and Philly Fed Banks: manufacturing continues leading the way towards recession 🧵... NY Fed manufacturing survey has gyrated violently recently but has averaged below zero (contraction territory) for a year; price increases have slowed but not stopped; labor market contracting; planned investment remains low: