Calculated Risk

I've followed the 'Calculated Risk' and 'Naked Capitalism' blogs since the last crisis. On twitter I follow @MkBlyth and @nntaleb. Disclaimer: NC is fairly leftish, but I don't consider that a flaw. I'd be interested in learning about rightish blogs of the same depth and quality. [0] https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ [1] https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/

For solid data points and analysis on how the US economy is performing I follow: https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ The blog is authored by Bill McBride who correctly called the 2008 downturn and housing market blow-up. I find his data points and corresponding analysis to be much better than any coverage in major media organizations, and it has majorly influenced the financial decisions that I have made over the past decade. At the moment he is posting about a series of 10 questions about how the US economy will perform in 2020 that are worth checking out.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-kVyZDV_5XZA/Uz6n7yb5lNI/AAAAAAAAejQ/iFnxKHVQ… From a blog post on http://www.calculatedriskblog.com a few months ago, highly recommend the blog.

> CalculatedRisk changed his opinion as the facts changed (he is data-driven, and one of the best blogs out there). I should have emphasized this point myself. Also, the CR comment board used to be of HN quality, but for economics and housing. (Lately, not so much.) If you follow one econ blog, I'd heartily recommend CR: http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ I will note though for the topic at hand: CR has commented that there is little correlation between interest rates and house prices[1]. I believe he has neglected that most of the data from which that statement is derived had interest rates (and borrowing standards) out of range compared to where we are now. [1] http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2013/06/house-prices-and-mortgage-ra…

There were people who were posting their stuff on the internet. http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ was a great resource before the crisis documenting how far off the rails the mortgage business had gone. I wouldn't say it went viral, but it did garner a lot of attention for a finance blog. Paul Krugman even mentioned it on his blog. Of course almost everyone I talked to about it back in 2007 treated me like I just said Stanley Kubrick filmed the moon landing. Back then it was pretty hard to say "Alan Greenspan is wrong and the guy on this blog is right" and have anyone take you seriously.

Calculated Risk (http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/) one of the best real estate blogs around, thinks that rates won't go up very far - 30 or 40 basis points, iirc.

Two other financial blogs I follow: http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/

I've been following the housing bust. In 2009, I remember reading a resignation later by a guy who made his "F* you money" betting for a housing collapse. He blasted the big banks, ivy leaguers, and old boys network. I bought complex derivatives (SRS, SKF) but lost betting against the market. I read http://calculatedriskblog.com for a while and educated myself about the macro factors in the markets. Through "calculated risk", I learned of Jim the Realtor http://www.bubbleinfo.com/ who videos (vacant) casualties of the housing collapse. Seeing it made it real for me. Over time, I've realized that the further from reality that decisions are being made, the more likely we are to make destructive decisions. When soldiers kill people with drone aircraft in video game-like conditions, it removes the reality from something that would be extremely traumatizing when done with bare hands. In our wonderfully complex world, we sow complexity, and reap disaster. Im not sure what the answer is, but there is something terribly wrong when destruction is more profitable than creation.

> this is due to a surge in imports in response to looming tariffs “GDPNow is an excellent tracking model, however, the January surge in imports - especially for gold - caused the model to move negative. As the Atlanta Fed noted: ‘the contribution of net exports to first-quarter real GDP growth fell from -0.41 percentage points to -3.70 percentage points’. Usually there would be an offsetting increase in inventories, but that is a lagging indicator. This is a short-term distortion and will balance out over the next month or so. I don't expect negative GDP in Q1.” [1] https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2025/03/a-comment-on-gdpnow.html

For a data centric view on the larger economy and an assessment of leading indicators I highly recommend this blog: https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2022/09/predicting-next-recession.h…

agree; when I look at https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2022/03/friday-february-employment-… I don’t come to the conclusion that now is the best time.

https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ https://econbrowser.com/

Good blogs: https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ https://wolfstreet.com/

Interesting. I haven't followed as closely since left the real estate business but thought he was always pretty measured. And data driven. See https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2019/05/still-not-on-recession-watc… For an example.

There's a great breakdown here [0]. The first chart shows age 15-44 deaths going up ~10% from 2010 to 2016. The third chart shows drug overdose deaths going up 50%(15-24), 80% (25-34), and 60% (35-44) from 2012 to 2016. [0] http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2018/05/lawler-us-deaths-jumped-in-2…

> Don't look to VCs for economic perspective. They don't have it. All they know how to do is raise funds and collect a carry. Don't look to political hacks like "A housing bubble would be good for the economy" Paul Krugman, or any politicians.... look to actual economists. Agreed. I really like what's happening over at Calculated Risk (http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/). Bill seems to do a good job at taking macroeconomic information and distilling it into something understandable. The Fed has not shown any real interest in wanting to hurt this delicate (and booming) economy with an end to QE or by raising rates. But most analysts seem to point to Oct 2015 to mid 2016 as the point when rates will rise. But we also said that about early 2015 last year, so who knows what will happen, until it actually happens!

Gotta call BS on her...she was one of the first BANK analysts [1] to say on CNBC that banks were effed... when it was pretty obvious to anyone not in a bank or not on cheerleading CNBC. Then she said munis were effed... went on 60 Minutes and scared a lot of people into losing a lot of money since there have been few defaults, bonds have performed well, and taxes have gone up. A genius is someone who makes the right call in the right media at the right time. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-06-03/meredith-whitney-offers-barra… http://blogs.reuters.com/muniland/2013/06/04/meredith-whitneys-great-m… [1] and not even the first - Ivy Zelman made a great case and got herself fired from Credit Suisse in 2007 http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2007/06/ivy-zelman-departs-credit-su…

Calculated Risk (http://www.calculatedriskblog.com) - I highly recommend this awesome blog for my fellow HNers - it plays host to great discussions/links/facts on the economy, housing, finance and the global/domestic (US) recovery. They did a series on the upcoming SF rent/real estate bubble, as well as the return of housing back in early 2012. The direct links for those who want more detail: http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/san-francisco-rents-on-tear.… http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/bottom-for-house-prices.html http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/wsj-on-housing-bidding-wars-… http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2012/04/private-money-coming-back-in…

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ has really awesome summaries of key economic data and development.

the backend comments site for http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ is down. url is http://www.hoocoodanode.org/

It is really interesting to watch how things were concentrated for the first 6 to 7 months of the recession, and then we fell off the cliff last fall. This chart is another great way of seeing how that happened: http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_pMscxxELHEg/SsXzzDSUSqI/AAAAAAAAGfM/PWX-2daR… (via http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2009/10/october-economic-summary-in-…

Has anyone seen any economic case studies, predictions, or articles...? Calculated Risk: http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/ The sidebar should have all the analysis you could possibly want. Try not to overdose on it while drinking; alcohol is a depressant.

German here living in CA. My take is as follows (YMMV): - We'll live and work in CA until scrappy financial independence is possible in Germany (ballpark ~3-3.5M net worth). - Once we could comfortably retire in Germany, we'll decide whether to move back there or keep working just to stay in CA (due to cost of living FIRE in CA seems out of reach) - In some sense starting out in CA maintains more optionality (it'll be easier to move from CA to Germany than vice versa) Advantages of CA: - The weather - Monthly savings (pay - expenses; much higher than Germany if you avoid lifestyle creep) - Career opportunities (lots of interesting work) - Outdoors (subjective) - Food - If your kids grow up in LA or SF, I'd say there's a pretty good chance they'll stick around close by when they grow up - Vibe ~ more optimism about the future and the role technology can play - The earlier you move and buy a house, the earlier you can lock in your real estate taxes (Proposition 14 [2] renders CA hostile to those that 'come later'). Admittedly, it's already pretty late in the game. Disadvantages of CA: - Housing prices are 1M+ (although the market seems to be changing now that interest rates are going up [1]) - Homelessness - Getting into good public schools needs a lot of planning (including buying in pricey neighborhoods) - Related: kids in elite schools / social circles seem to be under a lot of pressure to perform from day 1 (IMHO a consequence of the winner takes all…

Consider this sentence: "That inability is mushrooming, driven by increasing rents across much of the country and wages that aren’t going anywhere." One has to wonder: where is the money coming from that drives up these rents, if wages are stagnant? The issue is supply and demand. Why has supply decreased? Part of the answer is the housing bust, which followed the housing boom (irrational exuberance was counter balanced by irrational pessimism): http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2013/09/ny-times-on-shortage-of-buil… As it says there: "The latest land rush is in full swing, as developers realize that they have failed to feed the zoning, permitting and mapping pipeline, which can take months or years to turn raw fields into buildable lots." The other side of the supply and demand issue is the increase of foreign demand. Some of the money comes in the form of foreign money that speculates in the American real estate: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/07/nyregion/more-apartments-are-empty-y… As it says there: "But some Manhattan neighborhoods are assuming that vacant feeling the year round, because the people who own or rent apartments there actually live somewhere else most of the time. " A combination of housing bust and foreign speculation in USA real estate leads to a situation where rents go up even when wages are stagnant or falling. ----------- A possible explanation of the international forces at…

I keep seeing people post the Atlanta GDP forecast without context around the short term import imbalance. "the January surge in imports - especially for gold - caused the model to move negative. As the Atlanta Fed noted: "the contribution of net exports to first-quarter real GDP growth fell from -0.41 percentage points to -3.70 percentage points". Usually there would be an offsetting increase in inventories, but that is a lagging indicator. This is a short-term distortion and will balance out over the next month or so. I don't expect negative GDP in Q1." [1] 1: https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2025/03/a-comment-on-gdpnow.html

Imports may be neutral to GDP, but they aren't neutral to this forecasting model [1] [1] https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2025/03/a-comment-on-gdpnow.html

While it definitely contributed to it, the trend towards SUV/crossovers was already underway[1][2] far before with CAFE standards[3]. It's also just higher margins for the auto companies (mostly similarly priced components, but upcharge for size), so they've been pushing it everywhere. While not drastic as US, the same trend can be seen outside US even without the same laws[4]. [1] https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2018/05/the-changing-mix-of-light-v… [2] https://advocacy.consumerreports.org/research/the-rise-of-the-crossove… [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporate_average_fuel_economy [4] https://www.forbes.com/sites/judeclemente/2019/10/23/suvs-a-reality-ch…

From the same blog: vehicle sales are up 15% YoY https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2023/10/vehicles-sales-increase-to-… Not necessarily a sign of health, but playing catcup with hisotrical trend.

It is just supply and demand. Supply is half of what it used to be. https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtCkvoqzCIB… https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2023/05/housing-may-15th-weekly-upd… The supply demand situation is probably even worse in high demand areas.

That’s not consistent with the historical record. https://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2016/01/bank-failures-by-year.html?…