When we reported on the latest Tesla results last night, which showed the company losing $330 million in the quarter, or about $13,000 per car, while burning over $600 million in cash, one particular statement in Elon Musk's letter to shareholders caught our attention:
Authored by John Rubino via DollarCollapse.com,
Of all the mini-bubbles now inflating out there, maybe the least explicable is the race among emerging market companies to borrow dollars. This has gotten them – and their governments — in huge trouble so many times in the past (see the Mexican default of 1982 and the the Asian contagion of 1997) that you’d think dollar debt would be kind of a hot stove thing for Brazilians and Mexicans.
But no, they’re back at it:
Nearly five years ago, when looking at the cash and cash equivalents of Apple, which at the time was a far more "modest" $121 billion in gross cash (and virtually no debt at the time), we noted that Tim Cook's company was "the world's biggest hedge fund you have never heard of." Five years later, with more details available about its balance sheet holdings, we can conclude that in addition to the world's largest publicly traded company, Apple has now also become the world's biggest bond fund.
Continuing Jobless Claims plunged to 1.962mm last week - the lowest since April 2000
(right before the Nasdaq started to collapse and the US fell into recession).
While ISM surveys show employment tumbling (and ADP was weak)...
initial jobless claims for the last week also collapsed back near its lowest levels since 1973.
"Full employment?"
The US Trade Balance shrank to $43.7 billion in March, from an upward revised $43.8 billion in February, marking the month's deficit the smallest since October and less than the conesnus estimate of $44.5 billion. Imports declined by $1.7 billion, or 0.7%, to $234.7 billion, while exports dipped fractionally more, or 0.9%, even as the recently weaker dollar did little to boost US exports. Notably, the US trade deficit with China was $31.4 billion, followed by the European Union at $10 billion. The trade deficit excluding petroleum stood at $35.82b in March.