TheMeyersReport_07_26_2024_Fast_15
The Meyers Report 07-26-2024 Fast 15
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00:00Good morning, everyone.
00:07Welcome to the Friday, July 26, 2024, Meijer Report Fast 15.
00:15What a crazy world we're living in, folks.
00:17You got FBI Director Christopher Wray, who's claiming that Trump may have been hit with
00:23glass shrapnel rather than a bullet.
00:25Well, two obvious questions.
00:28One was, why was no one else hit with glass, but everybody else was hit with bullets?
00:33And secondly, what difference does it make?
00:36Because surely bullets were fired, and the security protection with which the FBI was
00:42significantly involved failed.
00:46Was it based on DEI?
00:48Was it based on the recently revealed questionnaire that was circulating around the FBI, which
00:57included questions such as, do you like President Trump, and some other questions as to political
01:05thought?
01:06I mean, what does this have to do with anything with the FBI?
01:09These people are crazy.
01:12Then we move on to the fire starter in California, Ronnie Dean Scott II, who is now 42 years
01:20old.
01:21He lives in Chico, California.
01:24He lives with his mother.
01:26He was arrested in 2020 on a DUI in Bidwell Park, California, where the fire started.
01:36And he has older convictions for child molestation, which required him to register as a sex offender,
01:43as well as robbery with great bodily injury, for which he was sentenced to 20 years in
01:49prison.
01:50That's the way it was described by the San Francisco Chronicle.
01:53Why is this man out of jail?
01:56At best, he should either be in prison or a mental institution.
02:00So obviously, the California legal structure is harming themselves.
02:09Don, what's happening with the fires in California, out West, and Canada, and are they being made
02:20worse by foolish, counterproductive environmental activities?
02:28Well, you know, the fires are certainly pretty significant in Washington State and Oregon
02:35and Northern California, especially out in Eastern Oregon.
02:38And we've had a lot of wildfire activity in Alberta, British Columbia, and parts of Saskatchewan.
02:45But when it comes to environmental policies, there's a lot to be said about extremely poor
02:51policymaking from really the 1970s through the 90s.
02:56Very poor forest management, leading to very unhealthy forests in a situation where when
03:04we do get fires, they tend to be severe.
03:06In Canada, a couple of things about the Canadian fires.
03:09First of all, there's a lot of wilderness in Northwest Canada where these fires start
03:14naturally due to lightning, and they're just unreachable.
03:20They basically just let them burn.
03:22But another problem in Canada is the Trudeau administration over the last several years
03:28has actually cut back on manpower and funding for fighting fires in Western Canada.
03:34So they're using-
03:35Why?
03:36Because if you've got me, trying to get in Justin Trudeau's head is a scary place.
03:42But that's-
03:43Scary place.
03:44Well, yes.
03:45Now, I do see the weather, especially in Canada, getting better, and I think they're probably
03:51at their worst in terms of the fire situation.
03:54But it is something in the coming weeks that'll still be making the news.
03:58Don, my wife Maureen keeps asking me when we're going to have summer here in the Midwest.
04:06Are we going to see any of it?
04:07Well, I tell you, the heartland has had a cool summer, no doubt about it.
04:12And it's hard to turn that ship around.
04:14Here we are almost August.
04:17I do see some August heat coming in.
04:19So here at the tail end, I do see you getting into some summer weather.
04:24But certainly this summer is falling far short of expectations in terms of the heat in the
04:30nation's midsection for sure.
04:32What about global warming?
04:35Hey, Bob, I bet Cabo's starting to sound a whole lot nicer right around this time.
04:40Don, the Olympics are starting today.
04:45What kind of weather conditions are the athletes going to be seeing?
04:49Are they going to be hotter or cooler than normal?
04:51And of course, since they moved the Olympics, what's normal?
04:54Yeah.
04:55Well, yeah.
04:56Well, it actually is going to start off very cool.
04:58In fact, the forecast high in Paris today is only in the upper 60s with rain.
05:02So they could have rain during the opening ceremonies.
05:06It's been a cool summer in Western Europe, and that includes Paris.
05:11But what's going to happen is they're going to be talking about how cool and wet it is,
05:15and then it's going to get hot.
05:16So they're going to see some heat come in.
05:19So you'll be watching and hearing about the Olympics and a lot of heat here by the middle
05:22of next week.
05:23OK.
05:24If it's a cooler summer in the U.S. and it's a cooler summer in Europe, where is it a hot
05:30summer?
05:31Well, you know, there's a correlation.
05:33A lot of times, Central North America and Western Europe, they sort of have similar
05:39patterns sometimes.
05:41So where it's been hot has been in the far western United States and then Eastern Europe.
05:46Same correlation there.
05:48So Eastern Europe's been warm, and the coastal areas of the U.S. have been the hottest.
05:54But the hottest part of North America has been Western Canada and the Pacific Northwest
05:58and California.
05:59OK.
06:00OK.
06:01By the way, if you like what you see and hear here, click like and subscribe.
06:08By the way, Don, we're not going to be having a Fast 15 next Friday because we're having
06:14our annual gathering.
06:16And Don Day is going to be at a massive or huge balloon launch, which will be with something
06:25like a suborbital flight.
06:28How else can we describe it?
06:31We're going to be testing, basically inflating a very large balloon, probably just off the
06:38coast of Cape Canaveral in anticipation for further testing for a near space tourist operation
06:47that's planned to be ramped up and ready to go by sometime early next year.
06:52So we're talking about, you know, a balloon that's eight, nine hundred feet long.
06:58And you're going to be going up in that?
07:00No, I'll be I'll be firmly on the ground.
07:05But Don will be reporting from Control Central at our gathering, obviously remotely.
07:14Good luck and have a good time out there.
07:16I will.
07:17Sounds fun.
07:18Isaac, is freight activity reflecting an increase or a slowdown in general business activity?
07:25And how are the freight markets doing this week?
07:28Strong increase.
07:29We're up 18 percent here in July year over year.
07:33So the industry hasn't announced a full recovery just yet, but we're definitely on pace.
07:38What's even more interesting is July is usually a slow month for us.
07:43Traditionally and traditionally in our industry, right after the 4th of July, literally the
07:47next day, the market just completely takes a nosedive up until beginning September, end
07:55of August, preparing for the holiday season.
07:57But we're not seeing that this year.
07:59We're seeing July roaring and I don't see any signs of slowdown until now, until holiday
08:04season.
08:05I got I got a question for you, Isaac.
08:09Even during the slowdown, your company, Legacy Express Trucking, has seen volume increases
08:16throughout the entire period for the most part.
08:20And is what you're seeing related only to your company or is this also happening elsewhere
08:26in the industry?
08:27We're seeing pockets of it again.
08:29That's the main reason why the industry hasn't announced a full recovery, because it is kind
08:34of unique to certain companies.
08:36What we do here at Legacy is we go after, the best way I can say, a certain type of
08:41product that doesn't turn our service into a commodity that a lot of powers that be are
08:46trying to really push amongst the industry.
08:48So thank God we're in a much favorable state than most of our competitors.
08:53So your company is moving against, well, has been moving against the down cycle or the
09:02down movement of the rest of the industry.
09:05That is correct.
09:06And also we're diversified.
09:07We run three different modes of transportation here, which has helped us dramatically throughout
09:11this down cycle.
09:13Okay.
09:14Also, assuming that Trump gets elected, which is a little less certain than it was a week
09:21ago, how do you think the Trump election would affect the impact with trade at the Mexican
09:27border?
09:28I don't think it will.
09:29The industry has been very bullish in a post-COVID environment on manufacturing settling in Mexico.
09:37With all the issues that we had during the COVID crisis with supply chain, Mexico shares,
09:44there's a lot of pros to come to Mexico, shares a border with the world's largest economy.
09:49And if we go into another pandemic, you can always drive a truck from Mexico to the United
09:54States.
09:55So there's been heavy amounts of investments in Mexico.
09:59About 50% of that investment's happening about two and a half hours south of Laredo in Nuevo
10:06Monterrey, Monterrey, Mexico, about two hours south of the border.
10:10Trades up about six and a half percent year over year on the cross border.
10:17Okay, Bob, as related to this, Elon Musk has announced he's putting a massive factory in
10:25Mexico.
10:26He's putting that effort on pause with anticipation of moving some of that production back into
10:32the United States.
10:34Bob, nothing much has happened this week in terms of economic news.
10:39However, Biden's dropped out and Harris is in, and the markets lost ground.
10:46So the question I have for you is, one second, is this related to the reverse of the Trump
11:02effect?
11:03I mean, if you look at what's going on out here, Biden was still in, and now Biden drops
11:10out and Harris is in, and then the market started to go down because obviously Harris
11:16would seem to have a better chance than Biden because Biden's chances of winning seem to
11:22be non-existent.
11:25What is your thought on that?
11:26Yeah, as we look at what's going on here, the economic news is coming in pretty much,
11:33I wouldn't say nothing's happening, but it's coming in very much as people had anticipated.
11:38We just got some data today on consumer spending and incomes for June, and June again is a
11:48month or so away, but this is the most comprehensive data we've gotten.
11:53What it's showing is that yes, the economy is slowing, and yes, inflation is coming down
11:58both overall and with the core inflation without food and energy, and the results for
12:05June were like a one-tenth of a percent increase, which is like a little over a one percent
12:11annual rate for the total, two-tenths for the core inflation rate.
12:16Now again, these are the most favorable figures we get on inflation.
12:20The Fed loves them because they tend to be lower than the CPI numbers, at least by a
12:25little bit, but this was what was expected.
12:27We expected that we would see some slowdown in the economy, and we're seeing it.
12:32We're seeing it in terms of income, we're seeing it in terms of spending, and all that
12:36is good news because what it suggests is that the Fed is now going to be pretty much satisfied
12:44that it has slowed the economy, and it's always concerned about the lags that the economy
12:48could get weaker, which it could with the lagged effect of money, but basically, the
12:54Fed is going to want to end up ceasing any restraint on money supply, and all of this
13:01was as expected, so there's nothing surprising here.
13:05What has changed in the past week or two, actually, it's just been seven days to send
13:10the market down, I think is the political environment, and yes, we're seeing an awful
13:16lot of enthusiasm on the part of Democrats because they believe the odds have shifted,
13:22and I think we all think the odds have shifted.
13:24It's much easier for them to run with someone other than President Biden, especially a woman-
13:30Anyone other than Biden.
13:32Anyone other than Biden, so the odds shift, and all of a sudden, the overwhelming belief
13:38that Trump is going to be elected is not as overwhelming as before.
13:44My expectation is that this could be the main factor that has impacted the market.
13:50There's so many things that it's always difficult to pin anything down, but I think you're absolutely
13:55right.
13:56This could be a factor that the odds are shifting, so all of a sudden, what happens if the odds
14:02continue to shift, and if Kamala Harris does a really good job of selling herself?
14:09Well, what happens, the odds-
14:11She's done that earlier in her career.
14:13Pardon?
14:14She's done that earlier in her career.
14:18Done what?
14:19Selling herself.
14:20It's a bad joke.
14:21Yes.
14:22Very bad joke.
14:23I was thinking about Willie Brown, but that's beside the point.
14:25If you can't say something good about a person, you shouldn't say it at all, but what we should
14:29say-
14:30You're right.
14:31You're absolutely right.
14:32I stand corrected.
14:33What's going to happen to the economy-
14:34We are civilized people.
14:35Of her policies, and basically, although they've changed the person who they want to elect,
14:42they haven't changed their policies.
14:44The policies are the same, and the policies would be extremely destructive for the economy,
14:49so that has to be weighing on the stock market, and if we continue to see her popularity increase
14:56relative to Trump's, then I suspect that the stock market is not going to take that favorably.
15:03Okay.
15:04There's something that I see, which I want to show you.
15:08A lot of the Fed policy is looking toward lowering interest rates because inflation
15:13seems to be in check, as we discussed.
15:16However, is it?
15:18This is what I see happening.
15:20Here's the price of gasoline from Central Illinois as a sampling that we've been tracking,
15:29and here's the price of diesel.
15:31In the month of June, it was down here, and in July, it's up here.
15:37It's significantly higher, and the same thing with diesel.
15:42The point is, it seems to me that irrespective of where the inflation numbers came in in June,
15:49when the numbers come in from July, they're going to be higher.
15:53Ergo, inflation will be higher.
15:56How are they going to get around that?
15:58Well, I think there are some very special factors that might be affecting the price of gasoline and diesel,
16:03and you would know more about that than me, but if we look at the overall oil prices,
16:08which had been up at $80 a barrel, they're now down at $77.
16:12If that continues to be the case, the month of July for oil prices as a whole
16:18will not be terribly different from the month of June.
16:22That's the key driver here.
16:25There may be specific factors affecting gasoline and oil,
16:28but I do not think that we necessarily are going to see that soaring inflation rate in July
16:35that we might have expected if oil had stayed at $82, $83 a barrel.
16:41Okay, so you're thinking that inflation is still going to stay in check.
16:46Yeah, and the reason, Gary, the key to inflation is how fast people are spending money,
16:52and these figures for June came out and said that the consumer incomes,
16:58consumer spending are only rising at an annual rate of about 3%.
17:03That's not enough to cause soaring inflation.
17:06Matter of fact, if the economy continues to grow at 2% or 3%,
17:11it means that we have very little inflation.
17:13So that's the way I look at the inflation perspective, and I know you disagree on that,
17:17but we'll just have to wait and see what happens.
17:20Yeah, no doubt about that.
17:22Don, are you seeing anything with respect?
17:26I know it's not necessarily in your area,
17:29but are you seeing anything in terms of inflation in your part of the country
17:33or any place else that you're going?
17:35Is inflation getting under control or not?
17:38No, it doesn't seem to have changed very much, and I think it's pretty much the same in most areas.
17:44I think people are seeing it most in groceries and fuel are the two big ones,
17:50but real estate as well.
17:54Well, you're an expert.
17:57Well, you're not necessarily an economist.
17:59You are an expert on the agri-economy.
18:02I agree with you.
18:04Prices for food, even if they're not rising as fast as quickly as they were before,
18:09prices of food are up 25% to 40% depending upon the item since Biden came into office.
18:15I don't see this easing at all.
18:19Do you see anything like that, Isaac?
18:21Yeah, I don't see it easing at all.
18:24Allison put in an order.
18:25I shared this with you, Gary, off of Walmart, just a pickup order,
18:29the same order she had about a year and a half, two years ago.
18:32It was same item, same exact order a year and a half, two years ago.
18:36It was $74.
18:37Today, it's $135.
18:41She keeps records like that?
18:43Well, no.
18:44She sees it as a phone, but the app keeps records of it, and she came across it.
18:48I got it.
18:49I got it.
18:50I just had to ask.
18:51I know she's organized, but that's organized.
18:54Yeah, not that much.
18:55Okay, quick poll.
18:59Who's going to win the office of president in November?
19:03Bob?
19:04Trump.
19:05Don?
19:07Trump, but it's going to be close.
19:10Isaac?
19:12On behalf of myself and the trucking industry, Trump.
19:16Okay.
19:18With that, I'd like to say be well, have a good weekend, stay safe,
19:23and God bless America.
19:24And take care, guys.