Daily Chartbook #182

Welcome back to Daily Chartbook: the day’s best charts & insights, curated.

1. Bank borrowing. "Banks reduced their borrowings from two Federal Reserve backstop lending facilities for a fourth straight week."

2. Office vacancy. "The U.S. office vacancy rate is at an all-time high as commercial real estate reels from remote-work arrangements."

3. Wage growth (I). "Wage growth for highest-earning quartile (orange) now strongest on record (going back to late-90s) at 5.3% … wage growth for lowest-earning quartile (blue) has rolled over from peak but still strong at 7.1%."

4. Wage growth (II). "Wage growth for job switchers (blue) and stayers (orange) reaccelerated in March, with former moving to 7.3% and latter to 5.9%."

5. Retail sales (I). Retail sales dropped more than expected in March, falling by 1% vs. market expectations of a 0.4% decline.

6. Retail sales (II). Month-over-month change by category.

7. Retail sales (III). "Retail sales rose just 2.9% Y/Y: this was the lowest annual rise in retail sales since June 2020."

8. Industrial production. " Industrial Production [black] number was solid, coming in at 0.4%, double the expected 0.2%, and following an upward revised 0.2% (from 0.0%)...Manufacturing output [orange] decreased 0.5 percent in March and was 1.1 percent below its year-earlier level."

9. Consumer sentiment. "Sentiment rebounds slightly in April, but still depressed."

10. Consumer inflation expectations. "1-year inflation expectations soared by 1% from 3.6% in March - the lowest print since April 2021 - to 4.6% in April, the highest since November 22. This was the biggest jump in 1-Year inflation expectations since May 2021."

11. Q1 GDP. "The GDPNow model estimate for real GDP growth (seasonally adjusted annual rate) in the first quarter of 2023 is 2.5 percent on April 14, up from 2.2 percent on April 10."

12. SPY short interest. "People are still too prepared for a move lower in equities."

13. Tech flows. Tech funds saw their 3rd largest outflow on record. 

14. Healthcare flows. Meanwhile, healthcare funds saw their largest inflow since November 2022.

15. Retail flows. "Since March 9 there’s been very consistent net selling—20d net flows are back down at a fairly negative level."

16. Retail performance. "Retail portfolios are still deeply underwater."

17. Active managers. The NAAIM Exposure Index fell to 58.71 from 72.89 last week.

18. CFTC equity futures positions. "Asset managers and leveraged funds are all but long this market."

19. Hedge funds vs. financials. "Hedge fund long/short ratio in banks is printing new recent lows, trading at levels last seen in March 2020."

20. Hedge funds vs. cyclicals. "Net leverage in Cyclicals now down to 0%-tile."

21. Hedge funds vs. defensives. Net leverage in defensives is in the 99th percentile.

22. Global > US equities. "Investors should avoid US stocks as expectations of a recession have become universal, according to Bank of America Corp.’s Michael Hartnett."

23. Growth vs. value. "Growth valuations vs Value remain at historically high levels."

24. ERP. "The market has NOT priced in a recession. Equity risk premium is still under 2%. There are levels last seen: During the 2008 crash; Leading up to the 2022 top."

25. Dividend pricing (I). "Dividend futures markets pricing 2.5% growth in 2023 and -2.2% in 2024."

26. Dividend pricing (II). "Over the long term, we think S&P 500 dividend futures are pricing an unreasonably bleak outlook...In contrast with the market pricing of 1%, we forecast an annualized DPS growth rate of 6% during the next decade."

27. Dividends vs. recessions. "Dividends typically fall by just 1% during recessions."

28. Q1 earnings beats. Overall, 6% of companies in the S&P 500 have reported, “90% of $SPX companies have beaten EPS estimates to date for Q1, which is above the 5-year average of 77% and above the 10-year average of 73%.”

29. Q1 earnings growth. “The blended earnings decline for the first quarter is -6.5%."

30. Q1 revenue growth. And finally, “the blended revenue growth rate for the first quarter is 2.0% today.”

Have a great weekend!