What is SLOOS anyhow? The acronym stands for the Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices. The survey is taken quarterly by the Federal Reserve Board. Respondents are the senior officials charged with setting loan policy—including lending rates and terms—at 56 of the nation’s largest banks. In general terms, their job is to make sure the bank gets rewarded appropriately for the amount of risk it takes when it lends money to business and household borrowers.
What’s new in the SLOOS world? The Federal Reserve released the January 2008 survey results last week. They indicate that most banks continued to tighten credit for both business and household lending between October and January. Below are the grim details. [Note: the figures given below are the net percentage of banks tightening standards; e.g., the total percent tightening minus the total percent easing.]
Why does SLOOS matter? After all, we already knew about banks’ mortgage problems and how hard it’s become to get a loan. The most important question about the economy today is whether the problems in housing and mortgage finance will spread to other industries. Bank lending policies are important to the answer. The SLOOS survey shows that banks have become less willing to make loans to most types of customers, not the hoped-for response! (Nancy D. Sidhu)
PR: http://federalreserve.gov/boarddocs/SnLoanSurvey/200801/fullreport.pdf
The U.S. Census Bureau reported that total U.S. wholesale sales for merchant wholesalers edged down to $376.6 billion (SA) in December, down by -0.7% from the revised November value of $379.3 billion and up by +10.6% from the revised December 2006 value of $340.6 billion. December’s small decrease compared with the big gains during the three prior months. The last month-to-month decline was in January 2007.
Durable goods sales were down by 2.0% from November, but they were up by 1.6% over the year. The largest increase came in machinery sales, which soared to $30.5 billion in December, up by 12.3% over the year. Lumber sales posted the largest decline year over year, down by 16.0%. The automotive industry also continued to decline, falling by 2.2% from November and by 8.1% from December 2006.
Nondurable goods sales rose to $205.8 billion in December, up by 0.4% from November and up by a significant 19.3% from December 2006. Groceries increased in December after falling the previous month, up by 1.5% and up by 11.3% from a year ago. Farm products posted a small increase with a 0.6% gain from the previous month but up considerably (by 54.9%) over the past year. Petroleum sales also increased, rising by a modest 1.6% from November and by 43.2% from December 2006. The gains in farm products and petroleum reflected higher prices in those goods compared with last year.
Total wholesale inventories were $411.6 billion, a gain of 1.1% from November and up by 6.1% from December 2006. Durable goods inventories rose by 0.9% in December led by automotive (+3.5%). Nondurable goods inventories increased as well, rising by 1.6% from the previous month and by 13.6% from a year ago. The increased in this sector were led by growth in petroleum and farm products inventories, which were up by 9.2% and 3.7% respectively over the month.
The total wholesale industry December inventories/sales ratio remained low at 1.09, compared with 1.14 during December 2006. The automotive inventory levels remain a bit high relative to sales with I/S ratio of 1.47 (the highest since April 2006). Thus a further correction is expected in this industry. Overall, the falling stock-to-sales ratio suggests that inventories will need to be replenished at some point, through either increased domestic manufacturing or higher imports. More important, generally low I/S ratios indicate that wholesale inventories will not be a big drag on U.S. economic growth. (Candice Flor Hynek)
PR: http://www.census.gov/wholesale/pdf/mwts/currentwhl.pdf
The total number of passengers handled at LAX in December rose by 0.3% over the year, with the strength provided by a 5.2% increase in international activity. For the year 2007, 61,896,075 passengers were handled at the facility, up by 1.4% from 2006. This should be compared with the peak of 67.3 million passengers moved in 2000. The preliminary 2007 total for international passengers was 17,163,265, an increase of 1.5% over the previous year. The recent peak for international travel at LAX was 17.41 million passengers, also recorded in 2000.
December passenger counts at Ontario/Los Angeles International rose by 0.6%, despite another decline (of -62.6%) in international activity. For the year 2007, the total passenger count at ONT increased by 2.2% to 7,207,150. This was close to the all-time high of 7.21 million passengers recorded in 2005. (That total included 120,367 international passengers, compared with the 2007 count of 80,390).
The Palmdale Regional Airport handled 1,693 passengers in December 2007, while the 7-month total was 12,022 passengers.
At John Wayne/Orange County Airport, December traffic fell by 9.5% over the year. This followed a 1.8% decline in November. For the year 2007, passenger traffic at the facility rose by 3.8% to 9,979,699 persons, a new record level. The Long Beach Airport recorded a 1.7% increase in December passenger traffic. For all of 2007, the facility handled 2,906,556 persons, a gain of 5.4%. The recent high for the facility was just over 3 million passengers recorded in 2005. Palm Springs International Airport saw a 1.4% increase in December traffic. For the year 2007, it handled 1,610,943 persons, an increase of 5.4% over 2006. This was a new record level of activity for the airport.
The December air cargo numbers were down over the year, with tonnage at LAX off by 6.1% while ONT saw a decline of 15.1%. The preliminary 2007 totals also fell, with LAX slipping by 1.2% to 2.08 million tons, while ONT was down by 2.3% to 532,865 tons. As to international air freight activity in December, LAX recorded a 2.1% decline in tonnage, while ONT saw a 2.7% increase. (Jack Kyser)
LAX data: http://www.lawa.org/lax/statistics/tcom-1207.pdf
ONT data: http://www.lawa.org/ont/statistics/tcom-1207.pdf
PSP data: http://www.palmspringsairport.com/documents/Passbymo1207.pdf
LGB data: http://www.longbeach.gov/civica/filebank/blobdload.asp?BlobID=17590
SNA data: http://www.ocair.com/newsandfacts/newsreleases/2008/NR-2008-01-17.html
Inbound container traffic at the top ten U.S. ports in December decreased by -0.9% to 1.31 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEUs) from 12 months earlier according to the National Retail Federation and Global Insight. The year-over-year decrease in December marks the fourth month of consecutive declines. The drop in container traffic comes after a so-so holiday shopping and predictions of subdued economic growth in 2008.
The National Retail Federation and Global Insight preliminary estimate of actual inbound container traffic at the top ten U.S. ports in January is 1.28 million TEUs, a year-over-year decrease of -1.1%. Another year-over-year decline in container traffic is expected in February but increases are forecasted from March to May.
As a comparison, loaded import container traffic at the combined Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles decreased by -3.3% in December (to 620,558 TEUs) from 12 months earlier. For the 12 months of 2007, loaded import container traffic at the ports decreased by -0.2% (to 8.115 million TEUs) from the same period in 2006.
Port data collected and published by the National Retail Federation and Global Insight include Long Beach, Los Angeles, Oakland, Seattle, Tacoma, New York, New Jersey, Hampton Roads, Charleston, and Savannah. (Eduardo J. Martinez)
PR: http://www.nrf.com/modules.php?name=News&op=viewlive&sp_id=429
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