January US Retail Sales are Down

In nominal terms, Retail Sales might be up 0.3%, if you can trust those figures.

However, the picture changes if you deduct CPI. If you use the US Government CPI of 4.1%, real sales are down to -3.8%.

If you use the CPI value of Shadow Stats, which estimates CPI at around 7.5%, then Retail Sales are down -7.2%! That makes more sense. I can not see how Retail Sales can grow when business is scaling back. Shedding more light on this, Mike Shedlock asks the question, Does The Shopping Center Economic Model Work?

The hype reflected on the stock markets over statistics like this, leaves me cold. Is this a sucker trap being used by big players to offload shares onto the next fool ?

I just can not see any valid reason for equities to go up in the current local and global economic environment.

Dow Jones Musical Chairs

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- With Altria Group Inc. and Honeywell International Inc. booted out, the Dow Jones Industrial Average is now getting a little less industrial and a little more oriented financial and oil, with Bank of America Corp. and Chevron Corp. joining the world-famous blue-chip index.

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FMM Comment: Nadeem Walayat made the following point in his article:

"Don't Bet Against the Dow!".

"Investors should realise one important factor about the Dow 30 stock market index and other similar general multi-sector indices that are made up of a limited number of stocks. The Indices are designed to exhibit the long-term inflationary growth spirals. In that in the long-run the indices will always move to a new high! "

Beware the smoke and mirrors!