This week the Bureau of Economic Analysis reported April PCE (Personal Consumption Expenditures) excluding food and energy, the number rose 3.1%. This marks the first time this number has been over 3% since 1992. This is an economic number that the Federal Reserve watches closely as an indication of inflation at the consumer level.
What is Bitcoin? Bitcoin is a digital unit of value. It is an encrypted text file stored on the Bitcoin blockchain. The Bitcoin blockchain is an encrypted, decentralized ledger on a global public computer network. That is as technical as I'm going to get. Let's focus on the idea of a ledger. When you deposit money in your checking account or write a check against the balance, your bank keeps records of the inflows and outflows on an account ledger on their computers, and it is denominated in dollars. But it is still just an encrypted text file that represents value. We trust that we can exchange the value represented by that text file at the bank for physical currency or transfer the value to others to buy goods and services.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics released the January Consumer Price Index (CPI) report this week. CPI is a measure of inflation at the consumer level. CPI rose1.4% year over year. I know, it's thrilling! It seems people either yawn at this number or don't believe it accurately reflects what's going on in the real world. So, what is inflation, and why is it something we need to watch right now? Inflation is an increase in prices or a fall in the purchasing power of money. Some believe that Washington's response to the Financial crisis and actions by the Federal Reserve will be inflationary.
Several months ago, I had the opportunity to attend a webinar put on by the National Cybersecurity Alliance. The topic was general cybersecurity practices for businesses. Periodically they send me information on other cybersecurity topics. Recently, they sent an email titled "How to Avoid Online Romance Scams." With Valentine's Day approaching, I thought this would be an excellent time to take a deeper dive into this topic. According to the Federal Trade Commission, in 2019, online romance scams were the costliest category of any scam reported, with losses totaling over $200 million and the median individual loss being $10,000. And that's just the losses that were reported. We don’t have the 2020 numbers yet but I suspect the increased isolation brought on by the Pandemic has increased the number of victims and losses.
The economic data suggests 2021 could be a very good year. In this video I review the economic data and charts. There are never guarantees but there are reasons for optimism.
In the 2021 Outlook, I discussed the coming run-off election for the two Georgia Senate seats. In the outlook, I said equity markets tend to do better under a divided government than when one party controls both houses of Congress.