Succinct Summation of Week’s Events 9/7/18 (plus the future of the bull market)

The usual weekly summation is below with employment increasing by over 200,000 and, with unemployment unchanged, this means that those who had previously gotten discouraged and dropped out of the job search are now rejoining the job market.  And it goes without saying that the major negative is all the noise being generated by the tariffs war.  The bonus this week is a concise little 9 minute video posted today on Barry Ritholtz's Big Picture site featuring a debate about how much longer this bull market can last.  Hope you all enjoyed this nice cool weekend.  We've gotten a little taste of an early autumn this weekend. 

Succinct Summation of Week’s Events 9/7/18

September 7, 2018 5:00pm by Barry Ritholtz

Succinct Summations for the week ending September 7th, 2018

Positives:

1. Nonfarm payroll employment increased by 201,000 in August, and the Unemployment Rate was unchanged at 3.9 percent;
2. Jobless claims fell 10k w/o/w, from 213k to 203k.
3. MBA home mortgage applications fell a seasonally adjusted 1% w/o/w, up from previous 1% decline.
4. Same store sales rose 6.5% w/o/w, higher than the previous 5.1% rise.
5. Construction spending rose 0.1% m/o/m, up form previous -1.1% decrease.
6. PMI manufacturing index came in at 54.7 for the month of August, beating expected 54.5.

Negatives:

1. More noise from President Trump about Tariffs/Trade War against China roils the markets
2. Revisions to total nonfarm payroll employment for June was downwards from +248,000 to +208,000;  July was revised down from +157,000 to +147,0003.
4. Factory orders fell 0.8% m/o/m, down from previous 0.7% rise.
5. ADP employment report shows decrease of 56k m/o/m, from 219k to 163k; Challenger job cut report shows layoffs increasing to 38,472 in August, greater than the 27,122 in July.
6. Trade deficit declined to -50.1B in July, lower than -45.7B in June.

Sun 9-9-18 BigPic: BTV: Debating the Future of the U.S. Bull Market - The Big Picture