Median age of US housing stock is at an all-time high of 42 years. 25% of all US housing units were built earlier than 1960. (RJ)

US interest payments to the rest of the world now exceed 1.5% of US GDP. (CL)

Despite major advances in technology, GDP/capita in the US was lower in the 2000s, 2010s and 2020s than any single decade from 1950 to 1999. From 1950 to 1999, GDP/Cap annualized was 2.4% vs 1.4% from 2000-2024. (JM, CR)

Using UN data from '22, about 4 billion people live below the "modern energy minimum", which is at least 50 million British thermal units per year. Developed countries use 3X that amount. (Exxon)

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In the US, home ownership rate is 66%. It is only 47% in Germany and 90% in China. (JPM)

Budget deficits in the US as a share of GDP are expected to widen to over 6% next year, and grow to roughly 7% by 2028. For an economy that is growing with relatively full employment the levels are crazy. (CBO, JCOT, PW, ER).

When you look at the provisions in the Big Beautiful Bill that allow for full expensing of capital spending and research & development, it seems to offset the impact of the cost of tariffs for some sectors, especially pharmaceuticals. (ER, SR)

Much is made of the large amount of money in US money market funds, which at $7,072 billion is well above the $3,992 billion in 2008. However, as a percent of the S&P 500 market cap, it is 13% today versus 63% back then. (SR)

Nvidia now accounts for a record 4.7% of the MSCI All Country Index, larger than Japan's 4.6%, despite the Japanese companies having 6x the EBITDA of Nvidia. (HPL)

The price-to-sales of the S&P 500 peaked at 2.3x in March of 2000 during the bubble. Today it stands at 3.2x, the highest level ever recorded in history. (HPL, BB)

In the UK, electricity generation per capita has halved since 1999. (GS)

Grape juice update: 2019 Teularju from Sardinia in the Cocun cellar.

The stock of US debt equates to more than a quarter of global GDP. (IMF)

China's solar power generation capacity increased 54% YOY in the first half of 2025 and wind generation capacity grew by 22%. (SCMP)

On a median house price to average income ratio, Australia now has 5 of the 15 least affordable housing markets in the world. (Demographia)

If China invades Taiwan it disrupts over 90% of the high end chip production in the world. This hurts everyone, including China. The faster the world diversifies away from Taiwan for chips, the easier it becomes to invade and diminish disruption. (MG)

US Composite PMI unexpectedly rose to 55.4 in August & manufacturing PMI jumped into expansionary mode at 53.3. The rise in prices from the surveys put the PMI more into rate hiking, rather than cutting, territory according to historical relationships. (BMO)