Morning Journal--Real household income, four years later

News on Stocks in Our Portfolios

Cato beats by $0.03, misses on revenues

·                                 Cato (CATO): Q2 EPS of $0.51 beats by $0.03.

·                                 Revenue of $231.72M (-1% Y/Y) misses by $5.28M

Hormel Foods misses by $0.03, beats on revenues

·                                 Hormel Foods (HRL): FQ3 EPS of $0.42 misses by $0.03.

·                                 Revenue of $2.16B (+8% Y/Y) beats by $0.04B.

Emerson enjoys orders growth

·                                 Emerson (EMR -0.1%) trailing three-month orders grew up to 5% on year in July, as in June.

·                                 Process Management +10% in July; Industrial Automation zero to -5%; Network Power zero to -5%; Climate Technologies zero to +5%; Commercial & Residential Solutions zero to +5%.

·                                 "Orders growth remained steady, increasing at a rate consistent with the prior month," Emerson says, "suggesting continued modest improvement in global business investment." 

 

Economics

   This Week’s Data

            July existing home sales rose 6.5% versus expectations of an increase of 1.3%.

            http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2013/08/existing-home-sales-in-july-539-million.html

                The minutes from the last FOMC meeting were released.  They revealed a Fed that (1) was a bit more pessimistic about the economy and inflation, (2) split over ‘tapering’, (3) but everyone seemed comfortable with the ‘data dependent’ conditionality of ‘tapering’.  Bottom line: no clear agreement of the timing of ‘tapering’.  Hilsenrath’s official take:

            http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-08-21/what-bernanke-really-said-hilsenraths-fomc-cliff-notes-under-4-minutes

                Weekly jobless claims rose 13,000 versus estimates of a 9,000 increase.

   Other

            Real household income, four years into a ‘recovery’ (medium and today’s must read):

            http://advisorperspectives.com/dshort/commentaries/Real-Incomes-Four-Years-After-the-Great-Recession.php

            Greece likely needs a third bailout (medium):

            http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/10255527/Greece-needs-third-bail-out-admits-German-finance-minister.html

Politics

  Domestic

  International War Against Radical Islam

            The US dilemma in Egypt (medium):

            http://www.nationalreview.com/article/356306/attacking-enemies-islam-andrew-c-mccarthy