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The following chart shows the 20 year moving average of annual miles traveled per capita. A trend line in red has been added.Click to enlarge.This is definitely the most impressive "sure thing" failure yet. 0.9997! Sis boom bah!Sis boom bah.Describe the sound made when a sheep explodes.January 12, 2014Toyota Sees Auto Industry Growth Slowing in 2014Continued sales growth will be more a result of economic gains rather...

The following chart shows the annual change in the semiannual average of new one family homes sold in the West Census Region.Click to enlarge.What's the worst that could happen from here? Okay, sure. The growth rate is currently negative and has been falling for 18 months. That's just this winter's East Coast's polar vortex temporarily rippling back through space and time though. Any rational optimist can see that.Further,...

The following chart shows the annual growth in the S&P 500 Index divided by the annual growth in retail sales (excluding food services). I offer two data sets. One starts at 2004:Q1 (in black) and the other starts at 2010:Q2 (in blue). A parabolic trend line has been added for each series.Click to enlarge.Note that both parabolic trends are nearly identical. So much for the "fool me once shame on you, fool me twice...

The following chart shows annual nonstore retail sales as a fraction of total retail sales (excluding food services).Click to enlarge.The growth trend is extrapolated out to 2050. I'm simply showing what the future will look like if the current trend continues. If 10% causes shopping mall pain now (which it clearly does), then what would 20% do in just 17 more years? Or 40% just 17 years after that?A 4.2% growth rate...

The following chart shows real GDP.Click to enlarge.Four exponential trend lines and their growth rates have been added.Note that each time an exponential trend fails, it is replaced with an exponential trend of lesser quality. What doesn't kill us, doesn't make us stronger. Go figure.The next chart shows the long-term trend of those growth rates. I'm using the midpoint of my hand-picked expansions as the x-axis.Click...

The following chart shows the US trade deficit with China divided by the price of crude oil (annualized billions of barrels).Click to enlarge.It shows the amount of oil China could buy if they were to use their entire trade surplus with us to do so. That's assuming the price of oil would not be driven even higher in response to increased purchases of course, which is no doubt a bad assumption.The next chart plots the...

The following chart shows nonfarm payrolls divided by initial claims. I'm using quarterly averages to smooth things out a bit (1967:Q1 to 2013:Q4). In my opinion, the higher the ratio, the higher the potential for layoff surprises.Click to enlarge.The 3rd order polynomial trend channel in red uses the red data points.The 3rd order polynomial trend in blue uses all the data points.I would be among the last to argue that...

The following chart shows the 6-month moving average of the annual growth in clothing and clothing accessory store retail sales per capita. Keep in mind that it is not adjusted for inflation.Click to enlarge.We've experienced a lot of weather over the past few years. I doubt there's any reason to worry about the trend.Source Data:St. Louis Fed: Custom Cha...