VIPs Tuesday’s CPI report revealed that rental car inflation rose a massive 31.2% YoY in March, or 11.1% MoM; demand outstripping supply amidst the current re-opening goes hand-in-hand with the recovery in the ranks of the self-employed, now back to January 2020...

VIPs U.S. household cash flows from tax refunds and stimulus checks totaled nearly $650 billion in Q1, more than triple the $200 billion run-rate over the last decade; also aiding the eruption in consumption is the one-month delay of Tax Day and a rebound from winter...

VIPs Per the NFIB, Small Business Capex Plans declined to just 20% in March, a nine-month low; meanwhile, Inflation concerns, at 4%, marked their first positive z-score reading in 5 years, while Other concerns generated the highest z-score since April 2020’s lockdown...

VIPs The median estimate of a 0.5% MoM CPI gain is 2.5 times the average in Bloomberg’s survey records back to 1996, and has only been forecast 6% of the time; with more estimates above the 0.5% median than below, inflation forecasters are primed for a right-tail...

VIPs PPI General Freight Trucking, which tracks domestic costs on domestic producers, has skyrocketed; notably, Core Finished Consumer Goods PPI’s rise precedes March’s base effects, though this tracks core goods CPI less closely than does subdued import prices In the...

VIPs Wednesday’s consumer credit report showed that revolving credit grew by $8.1 billion in March, just the second advance in a year; spending was likely pulled forward due to fiscal stimulus, with the Treasury sending out $258 billion in checks and tax refunds in...

VIPs Private college payrolls were down 11.5% YoY in February and state government education employment was at -8.3% YoY in March; in the last year, education occupations saw a 311% rise in continued claims, bested only by personal care (446%) and food services (428%)...

VIPs Since peaking at 119 days last April, U.S. auto and light truck days’ supply fell to just 39 in March, the second lowest in two decades; March’s SAAR of 17.8 million in light vehicle sales was the second highest since late 2017, fueled by the stimulus and tax...

VIPs The NACM’s Credit Managers’ Index is blinking green, with all sub-metrics tracking risks out of contraction since October; though the NACM’s GDP-weighted sales CMI hit 73 in Q1 on a 50-breakeven scale, survivorship bias is likely skewing credit manager optimism...

VIPs Per the ISM’s March report, prices for Plastics and Corrugated Boxes have risen for three and five months, respectively; these two inputs also top the list of commodities in short supply, as the aftershocks of offline capacity from winter storm Uri squeeze input...