[The figures] fell in the largest markets, and where they fell, the bottom dropped out. In the West, sales plunged by 29.4 percent, a figure so large it is hard to believe. In the South, sales fell by 6.4 percent. These are the two biggest markets. |
a little bit of inflation could be a really good thing, but not too much of it. |
A lot of the main components are still showing weakness, ... We still have orders declining, and order backlogs haven't built up to any particular degree. This is the picture of a still-weak manufacturing sector. |
A lot of the main components are still showing weakness. We still have orders declining, and order backlogs haven't built up to any particular degree. This is the picture of a still-weak manufacturing sector. |
A point-three increase is a big increase. ( But ) to the extent the increase was due to tobacco prices, the market may be willing to forgive it, dismiss it, to put it aside. |
Although we've had some slowdowns in this economy, the unemployment rate is very low, the economy is up, [and] consumer sentiment is up, ... the economy's doing much better than it was four years ago. |
Although you see things not as bad as we were, it doesn't mean we will [recover quickly]. |
As far as its international strategy, in Japan and Germany Wal-Mart is still trying to find the right way to apply its discount models. |
As the rest of the world begins to recover and capital finds a better home overseas because U.S. bond yields don't look attractive and the U.S. stock markets looks like it fully valued or overvalued, ... (then) money doesn't flow here. And when money doesn't flow here, it starts to push bond yields up, and that starts to slow our growth and make the stock market look worse, and you start to get into this vicious circle instead of this wonderful circle you're in now. |
Back before the recession, we had strong job growth and no inflation. There's fuzzy thinking going on here -- I thought we'd broken the old idea that strong growth is bad. As long as productivity growth can remain high, fast job growth is not a problem. |
But even if you have a weak number next month, even if you get zero growth, you'd be averaging about 150,000 new jobs a month (for the last six months.) So the Fed would need to see something less than zero to change its mind. |
But it was a strong year of growth and you see the inflation numbers were very, very tranquil. If anything, bonds are going to focus on inflation so we should be seeing a good bond market reaction to this. |
Clearly, this is more strength in the retail sector than the Fed would like to see. |
consumer prices are really going to be under control, as well. |
Consumers are conflicted. They feel fine for now, but they are worried about the future. |