{"id":88666,"date":"2025-08-09T01:00:33","date_gmt":"2025-08-09T08:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/?p=88666"},"modified":"2025-08-13T14:57:57","modified_gmt":"2025-08-13T21:57:57","slug":"black-coffee-9-aug-2025","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lenpenzo.com\/blog\/id88666-black-coffee-9-aug-2025.html","title":{"rendered":"Black Coffee: Sleight of Hand"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"It’s time to sit back, relax and enjoy a little joe …<\/em><\/p>\n

Welcome to another rousing edition of Black Coffee, your off-beat weekly round-up of what’s been going on in the world of money and personal finance.<\/p>\n

I hope everybody had an enjoyable week. Without further ado, let’s get right to this week’s commentary …<\/p>\n

Sneaky and underhanded, the Fed has been sucking the life blood out of the United States since 1913. Like a black widow spider, it weaves a web of corruption and deceit. Unknown to its prey, the Fed\u2019s bite is poisonous, deep, long-lasting and brings financial upheaval and misery to Americans.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u2013 Jim McCarthy<\/strong><\/p>\n

Credits and Debits<\/strong><\/p>\n

Credit:<\/strong><\/span> Did you see this? There\u2019s a personal finance trend known as “No Buy 2025<\/a>” where individuals commit to avoiding non-essential purchases that is all the rage in some circles. According to Yahoo!Finance<\/em>, the challenge is designed to ” help people reset their spending habits, get clarity on their financial priorities, boost their savings without having to make huge sacrifices.\u201d Then again, available discretionary spending has been gradually declining for a long, long<\/strong><\/em> time now …<\/p>\n

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Credit:<\/strong><\/span> While the no-buy challenge<\/a> helps you break longstanding habits, like reaching for your phone to shop when you’re bored, it\u2019s primary benefit is to help people reach larger financial goals, from paying off debt to buying a home. Unfortunately, for nervous realtors, it appears that consumers can\u2019t save fast enough …<\/p>\n

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Debit:<\/strong><\/span> On a somewhat related note, May’s tariff-fear surge of 8.3% in US factory orders was the second biggest monthly jump in 69 years. So it\u2019s not surprising that the May front-running led to factory orders in June tumbling 4.8%<\/a> – that follow-on decline is the biggest month-over-month drop since the pandemic. The good news is that, somehow, the stock market is still flirting – yet again – with more all-time highs …<\/p>\n

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Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Meanwhile, the latest jobs report that was released last Friday not only showed weaker-than-expected hiring<\/a> \u2013 it also revealed some jaw-dropping downward revisions to previous data. As a result, many macro analysts are concerned that the labor market is losing steam faster than previously thought. For those not counting at home, the US economy added just 73,000 jobs in July \u2013 that’s far below the 104,000 expected by economists. But even more startling is that the May and June figures collectively erased an additional<\/strong><\/em> 258,000 jobs, marking the largest two-month downward revision since May 2020. Ouch.<\/p>\n

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Debit:<\/strong><\/span> Even more disturbing, of the jobs that were<\/strong><\/em> created last month, the government sector was still<\/strong><\/em> responsible for 1 in every 9<\/a> new openings, despite the longer-term year-over-year loss of those jobs. Those jobs actually represent a net drain on the economy. In other words: Those jobs act as a black hole used to consume taxpayer money without providing any increase in living standards. And speaking of powerful black holes…<\/p>\n