Daily Commentary

MarketMinder’s View: Well this is nice. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is recalling some economists and IT staff to crunch all the data collected for September’s Consumer Price Index inflation report and release it. It might not come out on the originally scheduled release date, October 15, but it will hit the wires in time for the Fed’s month-end meeting, easing all those fears about policymakers flying blind without inflation data. We always thought those fears were false, mind you, given market-based inflation indicators still function fine and purchasing managers’ indexes give a timely, qualitative look at price trends. Not to mention the fact monetary policy would likely be better off looking forward rather than at backward-looking data points. But now there is a hard-and-fast “solution.” More importantly, this also ends the conundrum about Social Security’s cost of living adjustment, which relies on the September report—the main reason this is happening. “Under federal law, the Social Security Administration must publish the planned adjustment by Nov. 1. That adjustment is based on inflation data from the third quarter, however. As a result, a significant delay in the September consumer price data could make it impossible for the Social Security Administration to meet the deadline.” So for those of you who collect Social Security and were hoping to get a jump on your 2026 budget, you will still get the necessary information in a timely fashion.

MarketMinder’s View: The data here don’t pass the smell test (more in a moment), but the thesis and rhetorical argument are spot-on. Simply: Gold isn’t a sound long-term investment. It has occasional booms, like the present, but those historically gave way to big busts, requiring excellent market-timing. Given the booms and busts are sentiment-induced, they are impossible to time on a reliable, repeatable basis. And unlike stocks, gold doesn’t pay dividends or generate earnings. “Years ago, Warren Buffett pointed out the absurdity: ‘(Gold) gets dug out of the ground…then we melt it down, dig another hole, bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it. It has no utility. Anyone watching from Mars would be scratching their head.’” Now, where we think things get a bit dodgy is in the attempt to use stock and gold return data from 1928 to prove the point. Problem is, until 1970, gold’s price was fixed, which both artificially compresses returns until then and creates an artificial floor for returns after that, as there was a sizable gap between gold’s fixed price and market value before the end of post-Bretton Woods currency controls. We think a better way is to simply show gold versus stocks since those controls fully ended, as the data are clean and still prove the point.

MarketMinder’s View: While labor market data are always backward-looking, this is another bit of evidence Canada’s summertime economic soft patch was a blip. After steep job losses in July and August, Canadian employers added 60,400 workers in September (with the unemployment rate holding steady at 7.1% as more folks joined the labor force). This doesn’t fully erase weakness earlier in the summer, which followed a downtick in monthly GDP, but it does back up recovery signs evident in the latest monthly GDP and other readings. Overall, we think it shows fears of US tariffs roiling Canada’s economy were greatly overwrought, which isn’t shocking given most trade falls under US-Mexico-Canada-Agreement terms, remaining tariff-free. Markets are already aware of this, as Canadian stocks’ strong run since April shows, but having some data confirm it might help sentiment.