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Friday, October 24, 2008

Recession or Depression?

Volvo Cuts Truck Market Outlook After Demand Slumps (Update2): “Volvo said it received 115 order bookings for heavy trucks in Europe in the quarter, down from 41,970 trucks a year earlier.”

Nuff said. The rest of the article doesn’t even matter.

The only question now is: Recession or Depression?

14 comments:

Anonymous said...

Depression, no doubt! What about Great Depression! How about the Third World War?

Not a surprise to hear people talking about "Armageddon"!

Anonymous said...

Depression seems to me, GOLD just broken 700

Anonymous said...

Worse to open or not to open that is the question?

Can they afford not to open now. Wow. Karl over on MT had his one sentence and the kudos are coming in. Yesterday he called it days counting on one hand. My measily free personal chart look at is the CNN site. They had a talk back yesterday about are you out and getting back in. Fully one half were buying buying. Me and Karen from TX were trying to tell it. I mentioned financial ninja and market ticker and the St Louis Fed charts. Even though way late, I tried to tell them.

I looked at my Oct 07 401K sell last night and saw my settlement was on 10/9/07 for $43K to my IRA. In fact from clicking the button to final day settlement I made $312maybe the last positive $s in the market. I'm glad my wife and I are reasonably young enough and in reasonable good health. It'll be interesting to watch. We can all watch together.

It'll be great to be on the ride with you guys. I've GOT to get home tonight to watch Cramer Kudlow, et al.

Brant, Atlanta, GA

Anonymous said...

PS. How much will Buffetts $115 GS shares lose today? I wonder if I can buy them from him for a good bit less?

Brant, Atlanta, GA

Anonymous said...

brant, market will bottom when W.B. goes to BK...

Anonymous said...

DEPRESSION because history may not repeat, but it sure as Heck rhymes.

Until all the malinvestment is wiped out that occured in the Biggest Credit Bubble the World has ever seen, they are pissing on a 5 Alarm Fire with everything they have thrown at the Black Hole.

Anonymous said...

20000 trucks were ordered during the quarter. Problem is that most companies weren't able to get the loans for the trucks.
Fortunately, Volvo is know for safety, cause they've got a slippery road ahead of them.

Anonymous said...

Here we go...economy now resembles addict in treatment....gonna have a few " dry heaves" for awhile. It's a long process but we are healing. Might have a few times we fall off the wagon along the way but we are fixing our issues.

Charles Butler said...

I dunno, Ben (and 'i'mscared'). A quick click on the link would've led you to the Volvo quarterly report. The explanation for the low number is that they cleaned up their order book. Given that they booked 21,000 more unit sales in the last 21 months than orders, its obvious that they decided to book the 20,000 accumulated nonexistent orders against third quarter only. Third quarter sales are virtually identical to the same in 2007 and sales over the first three quarters are up 10% yoy.

Anonymous said...

Addicts...and the oil junkies that are now feeling the pain. OPEC cut production 1.5mbpd and price still falls? Wow I don't think we will see sabre rattling from Russia and Iran for awhile....their profits that gave them a little stronger step seem to be evaporating.

Emini Addict said...

Depression, Runs on the banks, America defaulting on their debt and a third world war. Doesn't sound all that far off to me.

Anonymous said...

OT
I think while gas prices are falling we need to impose
a higher gasoline tax and lower the payroll tax/raise
the minimum wage an offsetting amount. This would
continue to encourage less consumption and possibly
increase net income without placing a burden on employers or the gov't's tax receipts.

Anonymous said...

mild recession, perhaps a severe recession

Anonymous said...

Ben,

I generally like your blog quite a lot and you render a great service to the community. In this case one of your readers would have done better to check the figure. "Trust but verify" to quote a probably very untrustworthy figure from the past. The Bloomberg figure is an obvious misprint!

From the London Times on Line

October 24, 2008
Volvo profits slump as truck demand falls
Peter Stiff
Volvo, the world’s second largest truck maker, this morning reported a 37 per cent fall in third-quarter net profit and cut its growth outlook on both sides of the Atlantic in the latest sign that the global economy is heading for recession.

The company, which makes trucks under the Renault, Mack and Volvo brands, said that the economic downturn had been “significantly exacerbated” by the world financial crisis.

It said demand in Europe had declined significantly, that North America and Japan continue to be weak and the economic climate was having an effect in other parts of the world. Total truck orders for the quarter fell 55 per cent to 32,072.

The group, which also makes buses and construction equipment, has lowered its forecast for the truck market this year and now expects Europe to see growth of no more than 5 per cent, compared with 10 per cent, while it believes its North American market will contract by about 10 per cent from its already low level, rather than remain flat.

SS