Tim Gushue

Different sizes of oil tankers. A VLCC can carry around 2 million barrels of oil. ULCC between 3 to 4 million barrels. Current price per barrel around 90usd

Most Profitable Companies in 2025

This is such a cool illustration of how the Mercator map distorts the size of Greenland, which looks as big as the whole continent of Africa on that map but is actually the size of Mexico.

Average agreement with the statement "I often feel very lonely" over time, this time split up by age.

Average agreement with the statement "I often feel very lonely" over time, this time split up by age and smoothed.

Now taking into account age *in isolation* is no problem at all. We can simply do that by comparing people of the same age across survey years. The resulting pictures matches what I've broadly found in the literature (loneliness has increased among young people, but not among old people).>

Chart of existing home sales since 2016

Existing home sales accelerating, highest since early 2023.

On historic low-hire and low-fire labor markets:

1/ Hiring is currently extremely weak by historical standards, despite a relatively low unemployment rate. And layoffs are also low.

This is unusual... but not without precedent.

This chart explains a lot of it — as both the overall population has increased as has the share of the population that’s upper-middle class, travel/leisure/hospitality industries have centered themselves around those more profitable consumers, making the core middle class unhappy:

Graph showing job growth basically stopping in April 2025

Absolutely wild graph from @byheatherlong.bsky.social on the bad site

H/T The Wall Street Journal: Interest payments on US federal debt have grown to "over $1 trillion—more than military spending."

How the economy navigates the additional growth on tap will be a function of the cost of debt and, critically, sustaining high growth.

#economy #debt #markets @wsj.com

"An ounce of silver is worth more than a barrel of oil" - Brent Donnelly www.spectramarkets.com/amfx/ounce-o...

screenshot of my post

Big new blogpost!

My guide to data visualization, which includes a very long table of contents, tons of charts, and more.

--> Why data visualization matters and how to make charts more effective, clear, transparent, and sometimes, beautiful.
www.scientificdiscovery.dev/p/salonis-gu...

Something I hope everyone with a 401k reading this learns: being a bag holder for 13 years and 4 months is totally fine. Seriously. It's not a problem. Your most powerful source of returns as an individual investors is patience and just not worrying about being in a drawdown for a while.

Goldman looks at how the economy is relying upon the rich continuing to spend money — and how the rich are relying upon stocks continue to rise.

“The $ value of ALL call options - put options spiked to a new all-time high. This is concerning for stocks from a long term Risk/Reward perspective.” www.dailychartbook.com/p/764 via @dailychartbook.bsky.social

The U.S. has three options for the housing market to return to 2019 levels:

1. Home prices need to drop -40%
2. Incomes need to increase +60%
3. Interest rates need to drop to 2%

BREAKING 🚨: U.S. Housing Market

Home Sellers outnumber Buyers by more than 500,000, the largest gap ever recorded 👀

metric trolling

Reddit post by u/Unimatrix617: This wear pattern on my work laptop after 3 years Many—but not all—of the letter keys are worn out

Histogram of English letter frequency. Many—but not all—of the letters are frequently used

Love to see data in the real world

The shocking numbers announced on #LiberationDay have already retreated but the #effective #tariff rate on US imports still sits at its highest level since the 1940s, chart #JPMorganAM

When asked which country is the most important ally to their own, many people around the world name the United States. This is the most common response in 12 of the 24 non-U.S. countries included in a new Pew Research Center survey. It is tied for the top response in three additional countries. But others say the U.S. is their nation’s greatest threat. This is the most common response in six countries and tied for top in two others. In neighboring Canada and Mexico, as well as in Argentina, Brazil and Kenya, the U.S. is the top response on both the ally and threat questions.

Most people in Mexico and Canada say the United States is their country's greatest threat
www.pewresearch.org/global/2025/...

Really useful page from the Bureau of Labor and Statistics on job openings by industry over time.

New from @jessrem.bsky.social, an interesting break down on the types of places that are accommodating the most new housing: open.substack.com/pub/agglomer...

While outer ring suburbs are accommodating the most new housing, downtowns are growing a lot faster than inner ring suburbs.

After a brief recovery, US economic data surprises have turned sharply negative, contrasting sharply with the euro area:

How economics has changed

Daily close chart of GBPUSD 1y risk reversal since 2003. A risk reversal is an options trade where the investor is long a call and short a put. The chart shows the spread between call-implied volatility and put-implied volatility, such that higher readings imply investors willing to pay more for upside exposure to the underlying while low readings imply investors willing to pay more for downside exposure to the underlying. Both call and put are struck to the same delta in this instance (25), meaning that both options have the same exposure to the underlying. The chart implies the options market is the most bullish towards GBP relative to USD in over 15 years.

Please refer to explanation in the prior chart. Same idea, but for EURUSD instead of GBPUSD.

Please see explanation in first chart. This is the same idea but for USDCAD. Because we're quoting USDCAD instead of CADUSD (the reason is market convention), the readings are reversed. This chart also shows long-term USDCAD options the most bearish on USD since 2009.

GBP, EUR*, and CAD long-term skew versus dollar all hitting new highs. Options markets increasingly bearish USD.

If you have any questions about this READ THE ALT TEXT FIRST PLEASE then feel free to fire away.

*we're going to ignore the 3/9/20 print IMO

Now that we can see data past Easter, it appears international travel to the United States this spring has largely held up, despite reports about extraordinary declines. But there are ominous signs ahead. www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

a graph of real GDP for Italy

Didn't realize this until just now but Italy has finally, after SEVENTEEN YEARS, exceeded its pre-Great-Recession GDP levels

Welcome to Brexitland, US, in which waywardness is described as "strategic uncertainty", restrictions on trade boost performance and self harm is lauded....

Spoiler, it does not end happily

www.ft.com/content/342d...

The key chart right now:

Usually US economic pain is cushioned by falling bond yields and a strengthening dollar, which mean lower interest rates and more spending power for consumers.

This time we’re seeing the opposite, meaning the pain will be amplified.