Economy Blog

addslashes(The Real Story Wrap: February 19, 2008

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Texas Roadhouse(NASDAQ: TXRH) just proved the risks of owning a stock that is only a one restaurant chain pure-play. The company posted earnings at $0.10 EPS versus a $0.11 First Call consensus estimate. Its revenues came in with a 22% gain to $186.3 million, but First Call had estimates at $191.8 million. Texas Roadhouse put guidance for diluted EPS growth of 5% to 15% for fiscal 2008, which includes a $0.01 to $0.02 benefit from an extra week in 2008. Earnings on a diluted EPS basis grew 15% to $0.51 for fiscal 2007. So if we imply this 5% to…
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addslashes(Breaking: Crocs Steps in it

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Packaged-food companies all have been hit by high energy and ingredient costs lately, but some are more upbeat than others about consumers’ willingness to pay more for food.
General Mills CEO Ken Powell, speaking to analysts at a food industry conference in Boca Raton, Fla., today, said price increases haven’t turned people off its cereals, snack bars and pastries. “We’re not seeing any resistance from consumers,” he says. In fact, the company raised its earnings outlook for fiscal 2008 to $3.45 to $3.47 per share, excluding extraordinary items, from its earlier forecast of $3.39 to $3.43 per share.
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$$$ Natalie Bancroft [Portfolio]

$$$ The 1st Annual TimothySykes.com Crap Company Chart Pattern Awards [TS]

$$$ There goes a…
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CNBC reporter Charlie Gasparino recently answered 21 questions for New York’s Daily Intel, and I don’t want to say he’s been muzzled because nobody muzzles Charlie Gasparino but damn if it doesn’t sound as though, for reasons lost on DealBreaker, Dago’s trying his darndest to come off as some Yanni-loving, yoga-practicing,
‘in-touch-with-his-feminine-side’ New Age puss. For instance, to the question “Which do you prefer: the old Times Square or the new Times Square?” “Charlie” responds, “I actually remember hanging out at the old Times Square as a kid with my friends and barely survived. Any more info will get me in trouble. So the short answer is the old Times Square.”

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addslashes(Top 10 Most Searched Stocks on TheStreet.com, February 19

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But foreign investment will likely moderate in 2008.…
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Raw materials are soaring lately, and the rally isn’t confined to the sector’s headline-grabbing rock stars, gold and crude oil.. The latter was back in the news Tuesday after supply-related jitters pushed it to fresh records over $100 a barrel.
The broad-based D…
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Most Americans plan to hang onto their tax rebate checks this year. They also plan to lose some weight and get more exercise.
When Congress approved an economic-stimulus package that included tax rebates, it set off a lively debate over how much of a boost the rebate checks would actually give to spending. Only 19% of respondents in an Associated Press-Ipsos poll said they planned to spend their rebate checks. Another 45% said they would pay bills, while the remaining 32% said they planned to invest the money. But a recent …
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Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis President Gary Stern defended recent central-bank rate cuts as “wholly appropriate,” and he warned the U.S. economy may be in for a period of weaker growth.
The Fed “has taken appropriate policy steps to respond to a financial shock” that parallels the financial strains seen in the U.S. during the early 1990s, he said. While Stern offered an outlook that predicted the economy would continue to grow, he nevertheless said policy makers “need to remain sensitive to evolving financial conditions.”
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(February 19, 2008 02:00 PM, by Bryan Caplan) HD-DVD is dead; Blu-Ray lives. How long will it take before someone starts arguing that the wrong format won due……
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Heightened investor risk aversion prompts carry-trade unwinding.…
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Apparently a quiet night at home in the largest living room in Manhattan wasn’t cutting it for Stephen Schwarzman. His birthday celebration was certainly toned down from the multimillion bash at the Armory the year before. But he still managed to make it out for the night with his wife Christine Schwarzman. The couple was spotted by spies for Page Six at Le Cirque on Schwarzman’s birthday, which also happens to be Valentine’s Day.
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Since financial innovations can amplify the impact of financial-market events on the real economy, the Federal Reserve’s aggressive rate cuts are the right way to prevent market turmoil from exacting a major macroeconomic toll. While this sounds like the rationale recently offered by some Fed policy makers, the verdict of tres bien comes from central bankers farther afield - in France. In its February monthly bulletin, the B…
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Worries about inflation may be on the rise, and with oil climbing back within reach of $100 a barrel they figure to remain high. That puts the Fed in a difficult position, says Tim Duy, writing at Economists View. “I think it is somewhat ominous if inflation expectations have risen to where they were before the last Fed tightening cycle — I don?t see a Fed policy reversal in sight. And incoming global inflation news is not particularly encouraging either,” …
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Crocs, Inc. (NASDAQ: CROX) has posted its fourth Quarter revenues rose more than 99% to $224.8 Million while its diluted EPS rose more than 73% to $0.45. First Call had estimates at $207.6 million and $0.44 EPS. For fiscal December-2008, Crocs reiterated its previously issued growth targets of 50% for the first half, and it expects revenues of approximately $1.16 Billion and net income per diluted share of approximately $2.70. We show First Call estimates at $1.18 Billion and $2.71 EPS. That means that the bulls are going to have to hope the company is merely under-promising so it can…
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(February 19, 2008 01:33 PM, by Arnold Kling) A representative sentence from John Darwin’s history of the world since 1400, After Tamerlane (p. 305). The steamship and railway……
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This added to the case for further monetary tightening.…
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InTrade has just launched a new contract:

The Exchange has listed a market on an earthquake of at least 9.0 on the Richter Scale ocurring anywwhere in the world in 2008…
This contract will settle (expire) at 100 ($10.00) if there is an earthquake measuring 9.0 or more on the Richter Scale anywhere in the world before 11:59:59pm ET on the date specified in the contract.
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