Record Setting Times

Record Bailout: If you think it is bad now - and we are already at fiscal stimulus record levels - it could be much worse. Folks at Goldman Sachs - you know Paulson's former employer - predict the bank bailout could run $4 trillion. Guess what, we do not have it and according to an article in the NY Times, the world is not likely to give it to us. Go figure. They need the money for themselves and with all this deficit spending, the U.S. is not quite the safe haven it used to be.

http://www.cnbc.com/id/28918543

Declining Economic Activity In, Well, Every Single State

We have been holding on for a while with a few states improving and one staying even but December marked the first time ever that all 50 states, yep every single one, showed a decline in activity. Yes the Fed Philly shows the coincident index down in a royal flush of bad news. Now that truly is impressive. It leads to a one month diffusion index of -100. What does that mean? Basically we got a perfect score in the wrong direction.

http://www.philadelphiafed.org/research-and-data/regional-economy/indexes/coincident/2008/CoincidentIndexes1208.pdf

New Home Sales

Yep, another record. Seasonally adjusted rate of new home sales of 331K. Now the records started on this in 1966, so certainly at some point in time it was worse, but hey, it is all relative.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2009/01/record-low-new-homes-sales-in-december.html

Check out the Calculated Risk site for some pretty awesome cliff diving graphics.

Record Begets Record

So the low new home sales record leads to another record. This one is painful to see. Months of supply on housing is at an all time high of 12.9 months, as also reported by Calculated Risk above.

Continued Unemployment Record

Continued unemployment claims rose to 4.78 million last week, a new record. Not one in terms of percentage of unemployed, but one in terms of raw numbers.

http://www.workforcesecurity.doleta.gov/press/2009/012909.asp

Biggest Loss in 105 Years For Ford

Not a big surprise, but nonetheless, for a company this old, or any age, it is a record they would rather not set. Ford lost $5.9 billion in the fourth quarter to cap a full year loss of $14.6 billion. Shock - they are tapping their credit lines now before they lose them.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=aCT2mR1fO_EY

Just a taste of what is to come. Make sure you write those records in pencil and keep an eraser handy.

Disclosures: None.