Comments
Transcript
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CLMeh. I trialed back in 2016 and enjoyed the product. Unique content and big players. I then subscribed and became increasingly bored with the material. I know go weeks without logging in. I know RV had issues with Think Tank, but WTF is this access stuff? Yay, I get to ask a question. This couldn't be rolled into the TV portion? I literally interact with these people weekly on Twitter. And it's become an eco chamber. The same 12-15 people on rotation. I could not listen to DDM, Mike Lebowitz etc for months and could still know what they're thinking. I have no problem letting these subscriptions run its course.
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ZYI do miss the Think Tank format. Reading report is more flexible for me when I was free. For interaction part, is not my need. I think the content can do better like the free podcast like years ago and I won't mind to pay for that kind of podcast back then and now. Cheer.
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TORaoul, I suspect that the issue with TT -lousy renewals- wasn’t a content issue. Rather it felt in-cohesive. There didn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason around when we’d get certain Contributor’s content (ex. I think it’s been years since Steph Pomboy provided her work.) It seemed Compass and JTD was an attempt to provide some consistency or coherency; but, the real value was having access to a smattering of folks research & newsletters, especially those that aren’t otherwise available to us (Paul Hodge’s The pH Report runs $10k per year (which is out of most retail investor’s budget), 13-D is not available except to institutional investors, etc). My point, week to week, month to month, subscribers never knew what contributors’ research/newsletter would be available. (Perhaps another issue was that TT relied on the generosity of those contributors to make their work available to us.) Two final thoughts: Aside from being similar to RV TV, the “Access” platform already exists via Periscope, and folks like Luke Gromen are already doing this sort of thing as a part of their business offerings. IMHO, a Q&A forum where subscribers ask (or pre-ask) questions of experts definitely offers value. Frankly though, Ed, Justine, Tony, you, Grant are already asking fantastic questions on our behalf on RV TV. A weekly segment might be a bit much (plus logistically challenging). Perhaps a quarterly (or monthly) event, with a round table of guests fielding questions around an issue or topic would be better subscribed. I hope Access continues to offer us contributor’s research and newsletters. Thanks, Toby
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LDThink tank was good but geeeee there was a lot of reports that quickly built up......i don't mind reading but for me it was too overwhelming .... i like the way this access looks to be shaping up . nice 1 rv
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SSGood interview, but where’s my ThinkTank?
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NCWhile I appreciate your concern that the number of subscribers was dropping off, I much preferred the Think Tank format. I downloaded the reports and then read them in my free time. On many occasions I got invaluable insights. True there was insufficient cohesion and there were inconsistencies, but the current format is simply too similar to Real Vision TV. Therefore, IMHO, it simply cannot be considered as a logical replacement of the TT. Of course, Mrs. DiMartino Booth is great (my complaint has nothing to do with her) but one can catch interviews with her on Real Vision or other podcasts regularly enough. Could you please provide additional information about how you plan to upgrade the service? It seems rather expensive to pay for 4 monthly interviews (insights), regardless of how illustrious the guest list is. Maybe a regular “Macro Show” type of content (as was already mentioned below I think) would suit much better. At least for me.
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GHNot sure how this is much different than RV TV. Much preferred written reports. Guess I will cancel this portion of the service and leave it for others who find value
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CBHere is how you could make this service worthwhile. Continuity. The guest speaker outlines just 1 of her current trades. And if anything about that trade changes in the future we get an immediate update on what she is doing in response to that, before she makes her trade. Not her whole book, just 1 trade. It would be good for your guest as well as subscribers, because this would give subscribers a better idea of whether they would like to subscribe to the guest's service. I am always in search of a new newsletter to subscribe to. I am deeply indebted to RV for finding me one of my favorite subscriptions - The Felder Report. And I hope I can find others in the future.
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JMWith this change you are giving us "live talks and questions (live during the talk and beforehand), recording and transcripts, research from the guests that come on board..." What's gone is "a constant flow of actionable research that has been designed specifically to help (us) generate better actionable trade ideas."
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RMFirst off, I joined Think Tank for content I would never have been able to afford or gain access to. Quite frankly, the interview was great, however, I just listened to DD Booth on the pod cast Macrovoices for a full hour. By the way, it was free of charge. Most of these people can be found from time to time on various podcasts free. RealVision is not offering any new content with this added channel. Keep in mind, the readers of Think Tank are mostly retail, and, cannot afford institutional writings. Which is why I joined. These writing helped frame my macro view and offered investment ideas to look into. Think Tank also offered four writings a week on various topics. One 30 minute interview barely scratches the surface of the content that was supplied on Think Tank in a typical week. Access is almost exactly what the real vision channel is, the only difference being some viewer questions are asked. Like most subscribers I work and cannot take the time off in the middle of the day. Disappointed.
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JCInteresting conversation that I'd like to add a few comments to: - whilst i didn't use TT day in day out, i found it an invaluable resource at the appropriate time. I would drop in, pull a few reports out and digest at my own pace. As others have commented, as a personal, retail investor, there was nowhere better to get access to the thoughts of multiple industry 'experts'; - as i travel a lot it always gave me good plane and hotel room reading!; - this live tv angle just seems a bit too samey to RV > i already get the RV proposition and love it to bits. its the best value tv content out there. this doesn't seem that different and there is way less content. plus the time zones mean i'll likely very rarely watch live anyway... - to me the value proposition to a research compendium seems clear > if sub rates were falling off, perhaps it was for other reasons > not well differentiated, not as well marketed, not as good updates to subscribers? i certainly didnt get the chance to contribute to the conversation; - the change seems very abrupt... one day we log in and TT has gone, poof! no warning, no chance to decide for ourselves if we want to switch or end our sub there and then? - your platform is great. love what you are doing and where you are taking it, but this change seems like a step backwards honestly. of course happy to be proved wrong but bring back TT!
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CBPlease improve the audio quality. It is very difficult if not impossible to listen to this video.
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GGPlease bring back join the dots as well, otherwisen4 interviews/month has a high price tag. I want more from RV Access.
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CBI would like Real Access to require each talk to culminate with a real trade at the end. I am not bright enough to figure out the trade from a broad based interview. Like someone else mentioned, use Hedgeye's macro show as a model.
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CBI like the switch to Real Access. I am confident that RV will keep i timely. It has the potential to be more continuous than TT.
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JMRaoul Very much appreciate your responses here. Before I'm misunderstood, let me say I love everything about RV - everything but this decision to eliminate TT. You've referred to TT as being uneconomical and alluded to the poor renewal rates. Doesn't RON S. explain all of this with his point about indefinite trials?
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JMRaoul Of course the narratives between pieces varied - we rely on RV to provide us with that very thing. It varied in quality? Who cares - we weren't paying for GMI and therefor weren't expecting your 80 page tour de forces. I apologize but it's very hard for me to see how the renewal rates for TT were the lowest of your three products. Very hard.
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SMHi, Raoul. Appreciate the reply, genuinely. I think the problem may be that we were already getting this type of content via TV (the in depth, big picture stuff) You guys are the best out there for this, hands down. And what you have done so far is incredible. If you're peeking over at Keiths Macro show with the live Q&A, I think that works so well there because it's 'macro as its happening' sort of stuff. Touching on all the important macro events for the day.....whats happening with commodities, equities, gold, rates, EMs, etc, etc and how its all connected. I think that's what makes it so engaging there. You're well aware of our craving for market news. The macro show is actually quite possibly a televised JTD/Compass. We were getting our 'macro as its happening' fix via TT, I believe. The other in depth stuff via TV is fantastic but separate from quick fix/touch on everything content and as far as I'm aware there's none of that here now. Just my 2cents.
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rs@raoul There is a SINGLE reason why Think Tank was having the lowest subscription rates amongst RV channels. People could indefinitely use the 14 day TRIAL. There was NO reason to pay for the subscription. 1. RV should have disallowed credit cards to be used on more than 1 account. 2. At the minimum did a email verification via a one time password. 3. Given a 14 day trial but after payment of subscription, with a 14 day money back guarantee. You of-course have the best view in the house with analytics etc
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TFAbout the video & audio quality: There are (relatively simple) ways you could improve that dramatically and getting rid of the Skype (?) connection glitches. Record the video on both sides, ideally with separate audio and mix it together afterwards. There are a couple of ways to do that, all of them should improve quality dramatically over a recorded live connection.
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M.Hey everyone Couple of points that I can address. This is the first ever live talk that we've done. It's simple and it will get a lot of features based on the feedback that you send in to me. We plan on having comments before the live talk starts so subscribers can ask questions and the most voted ones will be shared with the guests, we want multiple time zones to join in so talks over the next couple of months will have different start dates plus other details that already came in as feedback and we're adding them to the roadmap. It's worth keeping in mind that a big majority of our community is located in the US hence the NY morning hours for the first talks. I know some of you are disappointed that Think Tank ceased to exist. Danielle has been very kind and provided us with her October research which you can download here: https://real-vision.intercom-attachments-1.com/i/o/163142286/f8eb48896e8dae04246bcc0d/THE+MID+CYCLE+MAN.pdf Roger, Jeff and all the other Think Tank contributors did an extraordinary job on TT. It was appreciated by part of the community but it needed a change to stay as a reliable and active product of the RV group. With this in mind, please let me know your feedback regarding Access in private so we can have a proper discussion and I can follow up with my team through out the next few months. There are some good suggestions in this comment thread already.
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SMThere is a fair amount of negative comments with regards to change here. The general consensus (at least here) appears to be that we were happy with TT as it was. What sort of feedback were the founders at RV getting that lead to the change?, if you dont mind me asking
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API'm a little concerned about this change. First off, DDB is fantastic. I love her & her research. To be perfectly clear. However, what happens when we have someone on here talking about crypto or PE or some other fad that doesn't REALLY apply to me or my clients? That's a wasted week. Then maybe another one a week or two later? How many wasted weeks do we get before we start reconsidering Access altogether? This is my biggest concern with the change from Think Tank. If we got a Join The Dots / Compass type publication to supplement this format, I would feel a little better about it. We got a strong start with DDB to be sure, but most people aren't her.
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JMI already subscribe to a video on demand product called Real Vision. How and why do you unilaterally eliminate/change a paid subscription (Think Tank) of subscribers?
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KW"Reminiscences of a Stock Operator" ... Respect! :)
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DWSimilar to TV. Can we have Think Tank back?
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FBWhat a desappointing format... I regret Think tank
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DHI feel like we need more bulls to be invited. RV appears to have such an inherent negative or bear bias about market and monitory/fiscal policy esp when it comes to "big names" and "regular speakers". This talk was interesting and the points make sense, and they may even be right, but the repeated message has become a bit tiring. Give other side a chance guys. Get some bull speakers like Yardeni, etc to present their perspective and make sense of why its not all doom and gloom in the current economic/fiscal environment. Bring more diversity of opinions, bring some strong/big bull names in your panels. I know fear sells, but you are here to educate. We are all here to learn. And you guys barely talk about things might just be OK (even if Raoul personally doesnt feel that way).
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GGSo...this is just another "expert view" series? I don't get it why this is better than Think Tank...
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API miss Think Tank. This is great, but I purchased TT for a reason.
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SMAlso miss the old Think Tank. The first taste of Access feels too similar to TV. It may prove too difficult for Access to be worth the premium to TV when contributors are essentially saying the same thing on both platforms. I'd be interested to know what % of subscribers managed to catch the live show. I imagine it being difficult with time zones and just setting time aside to catch it live for the Q&A and if you miss this, it is pretty much just TV., no?. With the old Think Tank, being able to read fantastic content and excellent analysis (and it was worth the subscription, imo) at leisure was an advantage. Maybe I just have a preference in which way I learn and retain information but I really enjoyed the reading material Think Tank produced. Is it not possible to combine old/new in some way?. I understand you guys are trying to innovate and allow subscribers access in some way to contributors. I wonder if an RVAccess private twitter account would work? (Subs verified). Maybe as a follow up to videos on Access where subscribers and contributors can converse and ask/answer questions, exchange data, etc. Not even sure if possible, just pondering alternatives to the live Q&A that retains the exclusivity to Acess subscribers.
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smsorry guys but i miss the old tink tank already... this kind of information i can find on twitter ( maybe not this deep )... but to generate a actionable trading idea out of that is pretty hard isn't it ? where is the edge ? regards from germany
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RAAudio, especially of Ed, was herky jerky—I’m sure Milty and his dummies are on it though. I’ve read Danielle’s “Fed Up” and enjoy her work immensely. Great lead off for the new Access Product!
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wjI follow her work so I didnt actually learn anything new.
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NDDanielle is GOAT economist! So sharp and I wish she was the head at the institution. I'm so grateful to RV team for insightful and really educational contents. Thank you. And please allow me to comment my thumbs up to the Compass & JTD!!
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RMGreat first session of the new RV Access product! Really enjoyed Ed and Danielle's discussion, and liked being able to ask questions in real time as Danielle brought up topics of interest. Looking forward to seeing how this new video format continues and improves. Keep up the great work RV!
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YOMODS OF RV - SUBTITLES PLEASE! Already disadvantaged not being able to join in the live webcast and ask questions due to timezone difference but please at least incorporate captions / subtitles! It will help us follow the conversation better
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RMEd and Danielle always make for a good pairing. Ed asks great questions and Danielle is a treasure trove of knowledge. The format, however, I am not sure was a real improvement over a standard interview. Ed’s picture/audio got garbled from time to time and while there was an effort to take questions from the audience, hard to do much of that in an organized way in 30 minutes. I would have preferred a more focused effort to address audience questions , perhaps, by collecting them a day or two ahead of time and synthesizing them for clarity and relevance.
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EQVery insightful... Danielle is amazing, haven´t missed one of her appearances on RV... wounder which inventory indicators does she use?... all those coming from the different FED districts surveys on manufacturing and services?...
ED HARRISON: This is our inaugural Real Vision Access. I hope that you guys enjoy this. We're going to have Danielle DiMartino Booth talking to us about the economy. She's going to talk to us about the Fed. She's a former FedInsider. And we're just going to start right into the questions here.
So Danielle, we had a recession watch, if you will, in the summer. And we saw yield curves invert. Everyone was really panicked. But now, it seems like it's an all-clear. But when you look at the data-- for instance, you look at the Atlanta and the New York Fed, their nowcast. They're showing for Q4 that we have under 1% growth. Are you concerned at all that the all-clear is premature?
DANIELLE DIMARTINO BOOTH: Well, I have a very hard time with big, huge pendulum swings. And when a consensus builds literally overnight mainly because the yield curve has resteepened, I get a little suspicious. There's no way, right now, that the yield curve could not have uninverted after Jay Powell decided to jump in, feet first, with $60 billion a month in purchases of Treasury bills, on maturity or less. So he physically, with the printing press in hand, uninverted the curve.
But what most people need to understand, I think, is they're forgetting their history lesson. If you look at the way that Morgan Stanley adjust the yield curve, the 3 month, 10-year, that is the one that the Federal Reserve follows. It might not be the 2 year, 10-year that so many in the market follow.
But if you look at the 3-month, 10-year yield curve and Morgan Stanley adjusting it for quantitative tightening, it wasn't May. It wasn't March. It was December 2018 that they feel that the yield curve inverted. Call it May if you want. But according to the Fed's own rules, Ed, all you need, back to data from 1950, is to have 3 months in a row of the yield curve being inverted.
Now, recessions don't start with an inverted yield curve. They only start when the curve has started to steepen out. And it's that second part of the equation that people forget. And the only thing that yield curve, probability of recession, such as the New York Fed-- the only thing it gauges is the level of the inversion of the yield curve. There is no way that it could not have been resteepening. But go back and look at the second half of the charts, Ed. You see that first you must invert, but in order to go into recession, you must then resteepen.
ED HARRISON: Interesting. I think that's a very important point. So then, obviously, the answer to my question is that you are concerned about the data showing that the US economy is slowing. And in fact, you're saying that the inversion came and went because now we're getting into a phase where a steepening makes it seem like, yes, we could be at a critical juncture.
DANIELLE DIMARTINO BOOTH: It's so difficult to say. Look, we have been following the IHS Markit Manufacturing. It seems to be leading the ISM, if you will. And what we saw in October was that for the very first time in 8 months since we saw the industrial sector roll over, the service sector was weaker than the manufacturing sector. The market mainly and only applauded the fact that we finally saw this smidgen of a turn in industrials, and there's no denying that. And we might be pulling out, even globally, of this industrial recession. That's still an unknown.
But the fact is the service sector, which employs 4 out of every 5 Americans right now, is the one where we're seeing weakness. We saw 63% of jobs created, for example, in September be in leisure and hospitality. These are the lowest paying rung of American earners, and they also happen to be last-in/first-out in typical recessions and in typical economic cycles.
So the jury's out for me. I will say that if you step back and look holistically and look in the future at the past 10 years, 2017 was the year that we had the VIX underneath 10. We had the VIX in single digits for over 53 days in 2017 when the global run rate of quantitative easing was $2.2 trillion. That's Merrill Lynch data.
Well, guess what? At the $250, $260 billion that the Fed is pumping in, we're already back up to a $1.6 trillion global QE run rate that does not even take into consideration what they're doing at the ECB.
ED HARRISON: There are a lot of places I can go on that, and we're going to come back to some of that later. I mean, that's a lot to unpack. But in terms of the US economy, tell me, what are the indicators that you're looking at that are most important right now?
DANIELLE DIMARTINO BOOTH: So the two sectors that we're following the most closely right now are continuing claims. And the reason we look at continuing claims a little bit more closely than initial jobless claims, both of them are very bumpy series. But just because people apply for unemployment insurance does not mean that they're able to receive it. You have to see that flow through into continuing claims data.
And what we saw, starting 3 weeks ago, was an increase on a year-over-year basis. And that's what distills the signal from the noise. But starting 3 weeks ago, we saw an increase in year-over-year continuing claims, and that has continued through the latest week. So now we have 3 weeks in a row of increasing continuing claims nationwide. The number of Americans collecting unemployment insurance nationwide has increased for 3 years. We've not seen this since December 2009.
ED HARRISON: Right. So that's definitely a clear recession signal. What else are you looking at? The sort of things that will put services and the manufacturing sector together, are there any sort of metrics there that can help us discern where this is going?
DANIELLE DIMARTINO BOOTH: Sure. Well, so if you want to think of a bridge-- because that's kind of the picture that you're drawing, Ed. If you want to think of a bridge between the industrial sector and the services sector, you literally have to find something that crosses a bridge. You have to find a railroad. You have to find a freight car.
We actually saw port traffic at our three largest California ports collapse, and that was led by imports. Now, imports decreasing, actually mathematically, ends up having a higher GDP figure as a result, but you don't want to see, in a consumption-led economy, port traffic via imports collapsing. And we've seen this run through-- just this week, we got fresh data out on rail traffic. It was down.
We got fresh data out on freight traffic. There's actually a gauge that precedes the cash survey. And whether it was dry load, refrigerated truck, we've seen these transportation metrics continue to slow and deepen on a year-over-year basis.
At Quill Intelligence, we actually look at individual states on an ongoing basis. Right now for the month of October, we only have 23 weeks of permanent continuing claims data on hand. But what we can tell you about those 23 weeks is that 78% of high-transportation states had continuing claims in the month of October.
And this was not purely a GM story. Obviously, there was a lot of stress in the Midwest, but I'll give you one example, the state of Delaware, where Amazon has a massive, massive presence, warehouses and what have you. We've seen rising continuing claims in the state of Delaware. This is not purely a GM strike or an industrial recession story that we're seeing. And again, that's why we follow transportations so very closely.
ED HARRISON: Interesting. Very interesting. Now, actually, I'm getting a question here from some of the viewers here, and it goes back to your bear steepener that you were talking about. So since this is a bear steepener happening because of the Fed, does the steepening of the yield curve still apply? That's the question from Rick.
DANIELLE DIMARTINO BOOTH: Well, I don't think-- and I'm the one who stepped into the hole, right? I mentioned Morgan Stanley backing into the effects of quantitative tightening to backdate the inversion of the yield curve to December.
But let's look at this cleanly and say May of this year. Prior Fed rate-hiking and easing cycles have been preceded by the Fed taking their foot off the brake. So what the Fed has done here is somewhat artificial, if you will, but I'm not going to fade the steepening signal coming out. Because again, first you have to have the prerequisite of inversion, and then you have to have resteepening.
But again, Ed, I'm not trying to speak out of both sides of my mouth, but I think it's critical to explain that the liquidity that the Fed is pumping into the system will have a beneficial effect. It will buy us some time.
ED HARRISON: Right, OK. Let me think about Q4 in that context because I opened up talking about the Atlanta and the New York Feds. And when you look at the Q4 data, the GDP data, what stands out for you about the data and what it says about what kind of numbers we're going to get?
DANIELLE DIMARTINO BOOTH: Well, I think some of the reason that we've seen those Fed nowcast models come down-- and actually, the Atlanta Fed one is-- I think it's 0.98. New York Fed is 0.7 at this point-- is that going into the trade war, there was a lot of stockpiling. There was a lot of inventory build under the assumption that the input costs for a lot of these companies was going to go through the roof once further tariffs were implemented, which we know is no longer going to be the case.
But now, if you're Joe Q. Company and you're sitting on this inventory, if you don't start to move that, if you don't see the final demand pick up, then you're not going to rebuild those inventories. And that, I think, is what a lot of people are missing in the GDP math, is that we've had a few disappointing inventory reads that have been more negative than what we were anticipating, suggesting that the rebuilding of stocks is not occurring.
And this actually backs right into the discussion that we were just having about transportations. In a million years, in a seasonal month, such as October when you've got merchandise getting to stores in order to satisfy holiday shopping demand, this is the last time of the year that you're expecting weakness when it's normally a seasonally extremely robust time for all transportations. But again, follow that inventory data. It's been a drag on the GDP forecasts.
ED HARRISON: Right, interesting. Now, actually, I'm looking here, and I see that there's a follow-up question. It's about repo. I'm not actually going to ask you about that now because we're going to talk about repo a little later.
What I did want to talk to you about for a second, though, is that I used to be a credit guy. I was in the credit markets in high-yield and so forth. And whenever I think about deceleration like you're talking about, I think, first and foremost, where is the credit at? How-- in a negative way into companies and where the default's going to come. What are you seeing in the credit markets right now?
DANIELLE DIMARTINO BOOTH: Well, it's interesting. We quietly have Fitch, for example, raising its default estimate for the year going forward. I'm not so sure that, even though we've known-- for example, Dean Foods was a company in distress. I'm not so sure that the credit community was ready for that bankruptcy filing. It's a very large bankruptcy filing.
Last week, we had Newell Brands taken down from investment-grade to junk-grade debt. And, as another example, very big junk issuer, Ford Motor, came out with very weak earnings report. There's a good chance that they have a second downgrade across that BBB line into junk territory. So if you're looking at S&P, if you're looking at Moody's, you are seeing the number of companies trading at very, very wide spreads, increasing at levels that we have not seen in years.
So what the credit markets are communicating is that there is stress building into 2020. And I think that that is something of