Tech Prepares for a Rough Year

Welcome to This Week’s Leyendecker View

Write it on your heart that every day is the best day in the year.
– Ralph Waldo Emerson

THOUGHTS FROM DOUG

There have been 22 years between the last tech bubble (1999) and current tech bubble (2021). Will it be another 22 years before silly money is again thrown at silly things? 

Sweden just discovered they have rare earth minerals needed for EVs and windmills. The hope is this will reduce dependency on China and curtail its rare earth dominance. This is great news, except it is supposed to take 15 years for miners to get the permits to start production. Fifteen years!!! The lunacy of man-made bureaucracy. 

Yesterday a good friend sent me a photo of the sign in front of Khyber Grill, an Indian restaurant  on Richmond Ave in Houston. It read: “Without freedom of speech, how would we know who the idiots are?” Indian immigrants speak their minds.

When we think the world is all stressed out, upside down, inside out, and doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense, we should probably realize this isn’t the first time in history such a feeling has existed. There is no progress without adversity.  

A soft landing seems to be the consensus view of the impending recession. But given December’s retail sales and industrial production numbers, maybe we’ve already landed on that down comforter.  

As inflation continues to fall, it confirms that all inflation is transitory. And if the global economy continues to struggle, we may soon see headlines about a deflation crisis. One investment bank thinks that’s going to happen.

Inflation is always transitory. Growth is also transitory. Recessions are, too. Everything is transitory. 

The saying “everyone is entitled to their own opinion” seems to have originated in 1946. I don’t think its originator envisioned that everyone’s own opinion could be blasted globally, every single minute of every single day.  

Maybe the new saying should be: Keep your opinions to yourself…online.

In case you didn’t know:

We have a climate crisis. We have a housing crisis. We have a homeless crisis. We have a healthcare crisis. We have an opioid crisis. We have a democracy crisis. We have an education crisis. We have a global debt crisis. We have an income gap and inequality crisis. We have a gender crisis. We have a children’s mental health crisis. We have an overall mental health crisis. We have a psychiatric drug crisis. We have an obesity crisis. And, after the last election, we now have a federal debt ceiling crisis.

Feeling better now?  

You’ve heard it here before: You should stop reading news.

If globalization retreats, will human oppression increase? 

A good neighborhood is like a big family.

THE ECONOMIC VIEW

December retail sales down 1%
The new Christmas frugality.

US hits the debt limit
Bet they find a work-around.
Yellen taking “extraordinary measures”

Industrial output declines
Manufacturing plunges
Wage growth is slowing
Here comes the soft landing.

THE INFLATION BOGEYMAN

Inflation 1998 to 2018
No surprises, but good info.
College costs rise 8X faster than wages

Used car prices down 13%
2022 US auto sales
Were the worst in a decade

Inflation is cooling.
Consumer prices plateau
Yet grocery prices may keep rising
Egg prices led food inflation last year
Producer prices fall but are still high

THE LABOR VIEW

Union membership at record low
Yet a new union movement may be growing.

US job market is missing 2.6MM people.
Why they’re not coming back

What do workers really want?
These five things
Are workers now less ambitious?

Washington stimulus money
Will create new jobs

MEANWHILE IN EUROPE

Workers in France are striking
They don’t want to work until age 64.

Europe’s friendliest cities
In case you’re planning a vacation.

Davos CEOs not in a happy mood
Some worry about company failures.

After Sweden and Finland enter NATO
They’d be open to having nuclear weapons.
As Norway ups armed forces preparation

PLAYING WITH FIRE

The Russians keep killing civilians
And destroying Ukraine’s infrastructure
How does the world accept this?

Russia’s business free-for-all
Necessity is the mother of invention.

Germany won’t give Ukraine tanks
Unless the US does, too.

Russia and Belarus start joint training
Belarus owes Russia money
Belarus gets attached to Russia’s hip
Is a new country joining the war?

GLOBAL

Price rises in Japan
Inflation hits 41-year high
Bank of Japan has its hands full
Inflation challenges easy-money policy.

China’s population falls
India is the new population king

Globalization isn’t dead
But it’s changing.
A fish gutting machine
Provides a de-globalization clue.

THE FINANCE WORLD

The new bankers to the world
May not be on Wall Street

Banks up their loan loss provisions
A soft landing would turn these into profit.

The new 60/40 portfolio
Bonds over stocks today?

Investors are avoiding US stocks
Europe and emerging markets are the new play.

REAL ESTATE

Is a rental home collapse coming?
Living in a volatile world.

Mortgage rates down to 6.15%
Maybe still too high to juice home sales.

Investors backing out of real estate
Fund redemptions are growing.
As rising rates hit landlords hard

NYC apartment market weakens
Air coming out of another bubble?

TECHNOLOGY

College student to the rescue
Creates an app to save writing and outsmart ChatGPT.

Could Apple disentangle from China?
This is what it would take

We can’t live without Chinese chips
Chips are the new oil in the US
Can the US bring chip-making home?
It isn’t going to be easy.

Big tech prepares for a tough year
For “little” tech, it could be worse

THE CRYPTO MEME

Rivals say FTX gamed markets
Sour grapes in the tulip trade.
Will the FTX exchange be rebooted?

Bitcoin pops above $20K
Is this a “buy low” opportunity?

The crypto collapse:
Might take down a bank
Yet another crypto bankruptcy
Digital currency halts dividends
Crypto exchange was laundering money
Crypto just a “hot ball” chasing money

THE TECH WRECK

Microsoft to cut engineering jobs
And then other jobs
Alphabet to cut 12,000 jobs
The end of magical thinking
Tech liquidity events gonna be sparse
Global IT spending fell in 2022

An average of 1,600 tech workers
Have been fired each day this year.
What this tells us about our economy

Artists sue AI art generators
Can only humans create art?
Getty Images also sues

THE NEXT NORMAL

What makes a good society member?
Pew has done the research.

Should we bring back extinct animals?
We’re getting close to doing so.
Growing new organs
Could it be on the horizon?

US consumers buying less wine
Young folks just aren’t into it.

THE WAR ON CARBON

Mexico bans solar shading experiment
Don’t mess with our air.

Swiss company sucks CO2 from the air
And then sticks it in the ground.

The Ukraine war in numbers
Alternative title: Climate policy’s destruction.

THE NEW ENERGY TRANSITION

John Kerry lectures Europe
We’re the climate leader now!

China’s 2023 oil demand to set record
Can’t live without it.
$100+ crude prices may be coming

OPEC has nothing on China
China has a clean energy market monopoly.
As Russia loses energy influence

THE EV DREAM

What’s the future of battery recycling?
Former Tesla exec opines.

EVs have 10% global market share
Europe and China dominate sales.

$100 a month to rent an EV
This may come to pass in France.

THE CHINA SYNDROME

China’s 2022 GDP was 3%
So says the ever-trustworthy CCP.
As China enters a demographic crisis
That’ll make the slow economy look like cakewalk
China tech stocks up big
Anticipation of a better future?

US and Japan sign agreement
Cozying up just in case.
Japan also cozies up to Europe

THE WASHING-TONE

1 in 3 Congressmen
Got FTX donations

The government debt threat
What happens when we can’t borrow?

Republican House wants spending cuts
Or they won’t raise the debt ceiling.
White House says no cuts happening

MAKING A BETTER YOU

The joy of slow reading
If you have the time.

Why sleep sucks as we age
Is there a work-around?

Life lessons from 1,000 years
What 90 year olds would tell their 32-year selves.

HOW ABOUT A BREAK

Planning a 2023 vacation?
The best European train trips
The world’s best train trips

Can you hack the billion $ lottery?
Maybe a little.

9-year-old archaeologist
Finds megalodon tooth on beach.

SONG OF THE WEEK

“In the Stillness of the Night”
Lyrics by ChatGPT.
Let ChatGPT write a song for you
Musician Nick Cave calls it grotesque

CASTING AROUND THE PODS

Rewriting the climate narrative
Glenn Loury interviews professor and Obama admin scientist, Steven Koonin.

VIDEOS OF THE WEEK

The sweet Belfast is top of the world.
One of my favorite films of 2022.

To Leslie
Hollywood insiders love this film.

The bunny jumping competition
Just plain ole rabbit fun.
It is the Year of the Rabbit

Movies set for 2023 release
Here’s a list of the goodies.

FROM THE HEADHUNTER’S KITCHEN

Got the crud?
Recipes to make you feel better

4 yammy winter salads
New comfort food?

Fake meat
Was nothing but a fad

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT

Disruptive Science Is Declining
January 13, 2023

Has China Tech Broken Encryption?
January 6, 2023