Today’s report on manufacturing in the Philadelphia region followed the trend of its sibling in New York and moved lower in April, posting a larger decline than expected.  While economists were expecting the headline index to retreat from March’s multi-month high of 32.8 down to 22.5, the actual reading was slightly lower at 22.0.  While both the Philly Fed and Empire Manufacturing reports declined this month, the Philly indicator still remains above levels it was at the end of 2016, even as the Empire Manufacturing report dropped to levels not seen since November.

Breadth in this month’s report was also relatively weak, confirming the decline we saw in the headline reading.  As shown in the table to the right, New Orders and Shipments both posted the largest declines, while the biggest increases came in Delivery Times and Inventories.

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This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone, but as the market has come under selling pressure in the last several days, bullish sentiment on the part of individual investors has declined.  According to the weekly AAII survey, bullish sentiment declined to 25.71% from 28.97%.  That’s the lowest weekly print since the election and a record 120th straight week of sub-50% readings.  Looking at the chart below, bullish sentiment has clearly broken its string of higher highs that had been in place since mid-2016.

As bullish sentiment has declined, bearish sentiment has seen a small uptick, rising from 37.38% up to 38.70%.  In this case, though, the chart of bearish sentiment doesn’t look nearly as significant as the chart of bullish sentiment shown above.

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On April 9th, airport police at Chicago O’Hare forcibly removed ticketed passenger David Dao from a United Express flight at the direction of United due to an overbooking situation.  The incident was recorded on multiple smartphone devices and immediately went viral once it was posted to various social media platforms.  The backlash was swift, and it only got worse after United Continental (UAL) CEO Oscar Munoz made comments about the passenger that were seen as unsympathetic.

Through our Bespoke Consumer Pulse unit, Bespoke has been able to quickly measure the impact that the incident is having on United’s reputation and bookings.  We immediately began conducting a consumer survey (balanced to US census) following the video’s release, and below are three snapshots highlighting the survey’s results.  Awareness of the incident approaches 90% at the $100k+ income level, and more than 50% of those making $100k+ in annual income said it will have a negative impact on their future flight bookings with United.

More than a quarter (26%) of consumers surveyed that had heard about the incident said they “definitely won’t book a flight with United in the future” as a result.  That’s a big number!

So which airlines stand to benefit the most from United’s lost passengers?  We’ll be sending Bespoke Consumer Pulse clients a report with the answer to that question.  Click here to start a 30-day free trial if you’d like to see the report.

With most of the major financials reporting earnings within the past week, today we were looking at market cap levels for a group of stocks we’ll call the “Surviving Six” — the six big banks and brokers that suffered through but made it out of the depths of the Global Financial Crisis.  The “Surviving Six” members are JP Morgan (JPM), Wells Fargo (WFC), Bank of America (BAC), Citigroup (C), Goldman Sachs (GS), and Morgan Stanley (MS).

At right is a table showing market cap levels for the “Surviving Six” at various points in time dating back to the start of the year 2000.  Back then, Citigroup was on top by a wide margin with a market cap of $178 billion.  JP Morgan (JPM) ranked second with a market cap that was half that of Citi’s.  The next date highlighted in the table is May 23rd, 2007 — the day the Financial sector saw its peak prior to the collapse.  On that date, Citi was still the largest of the group, but Bank of America (BAC) had moved up to 2nd with a market cap of $227.9 billion.

The third date highlighted is March 6th, 2009 — the low point of the Financial Crisis for the sector.  In less than 2 years, Citi went from a market cap of $272 billion to just $5.64 billion.  But hey, at least it survived!  At the lows, JP Morgan (JPM) stood in first with a market cap of $59.9 billion, while Goldman (GS) had moved up to second at $38.2 billion.

Finally, today’s market caps are shown, with JP Morgan on top at just over $300 billion.  Citi now ranks 4th at $162 billion, which is roughly $16 billion less than where it stood at the start of 2000.  Notably, Morgan Stanley’s market cap is almost at the exact same level it was at back in 2000.  Wells Fargo has impressively moved up the ranks over the years.  Back in 2000, WFC was the 2nd smallest of the bunch, but now it ranks as the 2nd largest.

Below is a chart showing the historical market caps of the “Surviving Six” going back to 2000.  It’s a fascinating look at the changing landscape of the industry over time.  The second chart below shows the combined market caps of the six companies.  While the S&P 500 Financial sector as a whole is still trading about 25% below its highs from 2007, you can see that the combined market caps of the “Surviving Six” has indeed taken out its 2007 high.

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