Key Points Fundamentals in the housing market are not terribly inspiring – sales are still scraping along the bottom, rates remain stubbornly high, inventories are on the rise, delinquencies are ticking up, and home equity growth is slowing. We’ve been optimistic about housing-related stocks, and this report is a gut check of sorts.
Key Points: Leisure stocks swooned when macro concerns were running high and rate cuts were in the offing, but they rallied strongly as the market’s outlook on the economy became more sanguine and rate cuts became less likely. Restaurant stocks haven’t performed as well, and fast food and dine-in restaurants have been on different tracks. This report fuses top-down and bottom-up analytics to assess the outlook for food consumption and restaurant stocks, in particular. Quick-serve
Key Points: Investors in consumer stocks need to navigate a few crosscurrents. Earnings quality is poor with employment growth being driven by acyclical sectors and incomes being propped up by entitlements. A crackdown on immigration, tariff-induced inflation and stepped-up student debt collection may create some turbulence in the months ahead. At some point, fiscal stimulus will come to the rescue. There might be a good way to trade around each of these events, but our
It’s almost impossible to have a discussion about the consumer these days without a thorough understanding of government policy. Our recent reports and webinars have touched on tariffs, immigration and fiscal policy. This report focuses on household balance sheets with a particular emphasis on student debt. Government and the consumer are tied at the hip. Transfer payments have been accelerating and are adding a full point to personal income growth. Government employment has been responsible
Key Points: Rubinson Research has been in business for a little over three years. We were super bullish on the consumer in 2022, 2023 and most of 2024. We turned cautious last fall, but we’re striking a more neutral tone today. Join us for a webinar this Thursday to discuss the findings of this report and many other subjects. We model the risk posed by tariffs from the top down and the bottom up. Figures
Key Points: Immigration was among the markets primary concerns before tariffs stole the show. We think it’ll re-emerge as a key talking point before too long. Immigration has been contributing almost a full percentage point to population growth, triple its normal contribution. We analyze border crossings, work permit applications, and state-level employment dynamics to understand the effect reduced immigration might have on employment and aggregate demand. Traditional labor market surveys do not do a good
This webinar details our outlook for the consumer. H2 ’25 will be turbulent due to a lopsided employment picture, incomes that are not as strong as they appear, an immigration headwind, collateral damage from student debt repayment, and tariffs. We expect the consumer to recover in early ’26 due to stimulus, but investors might want to be prepared for a choppy ride. We recommend finding stocks with pricing power and bulletproof business models. We introduce a couple of frameworks to help chart the course.
There’s a lot going on in consumer land, and this webinar measures the headwinds and tailwinds facing the consumer in 2025 and 2026. Late last year we grew concerned that the consumer was off kilter — employment and spending trends were unbalanced, and we were concerned that policy would dampen spending growth. Now that fiscal stimulus is in the works, our outlook has turned more neutral. There’s lots of math in this presentation, especially as it pertains to policy — immigration, tariffs, and fiscal stimulus. …
We’ve been cautious on the consumer for the past six months. It’s not just about tariffs. Employment growth is lopsided, PCE growth has been of low quality, immigration will soon begin to weigh on aggregate demand, the credit impulse is muted, the “wealth effect” is reversing, and real wage growth is already slowing. Tariffs are a headwind, but they don’t anchor our view. This 30-minute webinar walks through a ton of useful data.
We hosted a timely webinar that outlined a few tail risks. Employment growth is being driven by acyclical sectors like government and health care. Both of these are under a microscope. Job gains are heavily skewed to large firms with over 500 employees. That adds risk to the equation. Immigrants have also been driving the train, but for how long? Tail risk is also discernible within PCE. Obscure categories are growing twice as fast as “bankable” categories. Have a listen!
Hal Lawton joins a growing list of CEOs that’ve graced us with their presence. He shared key insights on our podcast. We talked about how a tight housing market pushed Millennials into TSCO’s catchment area. We talked about TSCO’s 7% market share, and the fact that outsized comps were driven by transactions, not ticket. TSCO has no direct peer — that means it doesn’t have to share its slice of the market with “like” competitors or fall prey to their mistakes. Give a listen!
We hosted a webinar to review the state of the consumer and to detail why 2025 might hold a few surprises. We dive into the labor markets with a focus on immigration; we assess the implications of other policies such as tariffs and taxes; we explore household balance sheets to understand how wealth and leverage might influence consumer spending. Our take is that a softening consumer will impact the interest rate environment, and that in turn, can have meaningful implications for stock selection. The slides…