German unemployment dropped more than economists forecast to a two-decade low in January, bolstering economic growth as the euro region
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Attention college students: The interest rate on federal student loans is scheduled to double this summer unless Congress acts soon.
Loans taken out for the current school year carried an interest rate of 3.4%, thanks to a 2007 law that phased in rate reductions for subsidized Stafford loans to undergraduate students. But the law did not specify the rate after this year. So unless something is done, rates on new loans will revert back to 6.8% — where they were in 2007.
President Obama urged lawmakers in his State of the Union address Tuesday to stop this rate hike from going into effect. He also asked Congress to extend the enhanced Hope Scholarship program, which increased the maximum tax credit to $2,500. And he wants to double the number of federal work-study jobs.
But it remains to be seen whether this deficit-conscious Congress will act, especially since extending the 3.4% rate would cost $5.6 billion a year, according to Mark Kantrowitz, publisher of FinAid.org. All told, Obama’s proposals would total at least $10 billion a year.
While the president has focused on expanding access to college for low- and middle-income children, lawmakers have taken several steps to whittle away at student aid.
5 colleges slashing tuition
Congress has eliminated subsidized loans for graduate students, as well as most discounts. They also cut $8 billion out of the Pell Grant program for low-income students and reduced the income threshold for eligibility for a full Pell Grant.
"[Since] Congress just passed legislation cutting student financial aid funding, it’s unlikely they’ll pass legislation increasing student aid funding," Kantrowitz said.
Raising student loan rates will prove costly, said Lauren Asher, president of the Project on Student Debt. Someone who graduates with $23,000 in debt will pay an additional $4,600 in interest over 10 years.
Two-thirds of college seniors graduating in 2010 had student loan debt, and the average balance was more than $25,000, the project found.
"In this tough economy, people are concerned about the cost of college and the burden of debt to follow," Asher said.
As with fast payday loans, this recently used to be the case, but competitive lenders and higher demand has taken this loan type to mainstay levels.
Retail sales look poised for a solid finish to the holiday season as consumers hit stores and went online to snap up last-minute gifts, according to data released on Wednesday.
Still, overall sales growth lagged the increase in online spending and some brick-and-mortar retailers struggled. Steep discounts were prevalent throughout the season, tactics that drove sales but could crimp profitability at some chains.
The International Council of Shopping Centers/Goldman Sachs weekly chain store sales index rose 4.5 percent during the week ending December 24, versus a holiday-shortened pre-Christmas Day week in 2010. Redbook Research put the year-over-year gain at 4.3 percent.
Adjusted for the calendar mismatch, the ICSC/Goldman index rose 0.9 percent for the week ending December 24, compared with the prior week.
“The finish is solid and the season itself was good,” said ICSC Chief Economist Michael Niemira. “November was on the soft side but December will be better.”
ICSC is sticking with its holiday sales growth forecast of 3.5 percent, which it issued in September.
“Major players, such as Macy’s (M.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz), are fine,” Niemira added. “Specialty stores are likely to be more uneven. Specialty apparel seems to have been hit by abnormally warm weather. Sales were on the slow side and there has been more discounting consequently.”
The biggest shopping malls and regional malls saw the strongest customer traffic since the first week of 2011. Factory outlets remained busy, but less so than the prior week, he said.
Consumers ratcheted down their online spending compared with
earlier in December, but visits to and spending at electronics and department stores increased during the week, Niemira noted.
U.S. consumer confidence rose more than expected in December, hitting an eight-month high, as Americans grew more upbeat about the labor market and their financial situation, the Conference Board said on Tuesday. That followed a report early in December showing U.S. unemployment at the lowest level since March 2009.
However, U.S. house prices are still falling, tempering economic optimism, and some retailers are suffering.
Sears Holdings Corp (SHLD.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) said on Tuesday that it will shut as many as 120 stores after poor sales. Borders Group (BGPIQ.PK: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Filene’s Basement were among retailers that filed for bankruptcy protection from creditors this year, and shut down, with Filene’s stores set to close shortly.
Part of the problem may be competition with online retailers, who saw faster sales growth this holiday season, suggesting e-commerce took market share from brick-and-mortar stores.
Online spending in the United States reached a record $35.27 billion from November 1 through December 26, up 15 percent versus the corresponding period last year, comScore (SCOR.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) reported.
For the week ending December 25, consumers spent $2.83 billion online, up 16 percent from the corresponding period in 2010, comScore also said.
“E-commerce is going to be awesome this holiday and retail will be mediocre,” said Michael Rubin, head of Kynetic, which owns online retail businesses Fanatics, Rue La La and ShopRunner.
Firing tear gas and rubber bullets, Egyptian riot police on Sunday clashed for a second day with thousands of rock-throwing protesters demanding that the ruling military quickly announce a date to hand over power to an elected government.
The police battled an estimated 5,000 protesters in and around central Cairo’s Tahrir Square, birthplace of the 18-day uprising that toppled authoritarian leader Hosni Mubarak in February. Tear gas filled the air as protesters, many chanting “freedom, freedom,” pelted the police with rocks.
Sunday’s clashes, which come a day after two people were killed and hundreds wounded in similar violence in the capital and other cities, are stoking tensions eight days before the start of the country’s first post-Mubarak parliamentary elections. Public anger has risen over the slow pace of reforms and apparent attempts by Egypt’s ruling generals to retain power over a future civilian government.
“We have a single demand: The marshal must step down and be replaced by a civilian council,” said protester Ahmed Hani, referring Field Marshal Hussein Tantawi, Egypt’s military ruler and Mubarak’s longtime defense minister.
“The violence yesterday showed us that Mubarak is still in power,” said Hani, who was wounded in the forehead by a rubber bullet. He spoke over chants of “freedom, freedom” by hundreds of protesters around him.
Rocks, shattered glass and trash covered most of the ground in and around Tahrir early Sunday, while a cloud of white smoke caused by the use of dozens of tear gas shells hung in the air. Several hundred protesters were camping out on the lawn of the square’s traffic island, and protesters manning barricades into the square checked the IDs of anyone entering the plaza.
The windows of the main campus of the American University in Cairo, which overlooks the square, were shattered and stores were shuttered. “The marshal is Mubarak’s dog,” said one of a fresh crop of graffiti in the square.
Yahya el-Sawi, a 21-year-old university student, said he was enraged by the sight of riot police beating up protesters already hurt in an earlier attack by the security forces. “I did not support the sit-in at the beginning, but when I saw this brutality I had to come back to be with my brothers,” he said.
Many of the protesters had red eyes and coughed incessantly. Some wore surgical masks to fend off against the tear gas. A few fainted, overwhelmed by the gas.
Sunday’s clashes, which were mostly on a road leading from Tahrir to the Interior Ministry, appeared likely to grow.
Protesters were using social networking sites on the Internet to call on Egyptians to join them, and there were reports of several demonstrations headed to the square, including one from Cairo University guaranteed approval cash advance loans.
The military, which took over from Mubarak, has repeatedly pledged to hand over power to an elected government but it has yet to set a specific date. According to one timetable floated by the military, the handover will take place after presidential elections are held late next year or early in 2013. The protesters say this is too late and accuse the military of dragging its feet. They want a handover to take place immediately after the end of parliamentary elections in March.
On Saturday, police fired rubber bullets, tear gas and beat protesters with batons, clearing the square at one point and pushing the fighting into surrounding side streets of downtown Cairo.
A 23-year-old protester died from a gunshot, said Health Ministry official Mohammed el-Sherbeni. At least 676 people were injured, he said. Another protester was killed in Alexandria, where clashes also took place, said a security official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to journalists.
After nightfall, protesters swarmed back into Tahrir in the thousands, and running battles with the police in the streets took place throughout the night. Acrid smoke of tires set ablaze mixed with the stinging white smoke of tear gas.
The government urged protesters to clear the square.
A member of the military council, Maj. Gen. Mohsen el-Fangari, said protesters’ calls for change ahead of the election were a threat to the state.
“What is the point of being in Tahrir?” he asked, speaking by phone to a private TV channel. “What is the point of this strike, of the million marches? Aren’t there legal channels to pursue demands in a way that won’t impact Egypt … internationally?”
“The aim of what is going on is to shake the backbone of the state, which is the armed forces.”
In a warning, he said, “If security is not applied, we will implement the rule of law. Anyone who does wrong will pay for it.”
Saturday’s confrontation was one of the few since the uprising to involve the police, which have largely stayed in the background while the military took charge of security. There was no military presence in and around the square on Saturday or on Sunday. The black-clad police were a hated symbol of Mubarak’s regime.
Some of the wounded had blood streaming down their faces and many had to be carried out of the square by fellow protesters to waiting ambulances. Human rights activists accused police of using excessive force.
Police arrested 18 people, state TV reported, describing the protesters as rioters.
China will phase out power-draining light bulbs in an efficiency move certain to impact the global market.
The world’s biggest polluter will ban imports and sales of 100-watt-and-higher incandescent bulbs from Oct. 1, 2012. Lower-watt bulbs will be banned in phases until 2016.
China’s main planning agency says 3.85 billion incandescent light bulbs were produced here last year and 1 billion were sold domestically bad credit pay day loans.
The agency’s statement Friday said 12 percent of China’s total electricity use is for lighting. The move is meant to save energy and curb climate change.
The United States and the 27-nation European Union are phasing out the bulbs beginning next year as well.
Forecasters say Tropical Storm Rina has formed in the Caribbean Sea off the coasts of Honduras and Nicaragua and it could become a hurricane by the end of the week.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Sunday night that the storm’s center was located about 115 miles (185 kilometers) northeast of Cabo Gracias on the border of Honduras and Nicaragua.
It had maximum sustained winds of 40 miles per hour (64 kph) and was moving north-northwest at 8 mph (13 kph) quick payday loans.
A tropical storm watch was in effect on the coast of Honduras from Punta Castilla eastward to the Nicaraguan border.
Forecasters expect Rina to gain strength in the next 48 hours and said it could become a hurricane by the end of the week.
In response to my Sunday business story about the struggles at St. Louis Union Station, a number of readers have suggested that one of the problems is that you have to pay for parking there.
The parking rate, according to the venue’s website, is $1 for every half hour. And there’s a flat rate of $12 for 6 to 10 hours.
If you forgo the parking lot in the back, there is street parking along Market Street. But that is metered parking, so you still have to pay for that and deal with the hassle of plugging a meter.
I can see pros and cons to both sides. On the one hand, you don’t have to pay to park at other (and pardon me for using the term) “malls” in the region. Of course, Union Station’s management doesn’t consider the venue a mall, but a tourist destination and historic landmark.
But in any case, I think it’s fair to say that nobody like to pay to park payday loans. And if you’re going to do so, you have to give people a good reason to do so.
On the other hand, Union Station is in downtown, where you don’t find a lot of free parking. And it’s not too far from other major entertainment venues downtown — Busch Stadium, Scottrade Center, the Peabody Opera House, etc. So if it did have a free parking lot, Cardinals and Blues fans might end up using it a lot (to the chagrin of other parking lot attendants around town).
And I should add that paid parking lot no doubt brings in much-needed revenue to Union Station.
So what do you think? Do you think Union Station should charge for parking?
Wednesday was a good day for Fawad Khan.
He got up shortly before 3 a.m. and headed to a bank of computers in his Mississauga basement. While his family slept, he started trading.
One screen charted the euro in real time. It looked like the seismic readout for an earthquake. Trading in this kind of market, with one’s own money, is not for the faint of heart.
At 3 a.m., Khan bought euros, expecting the currency’s value to rise. When it did, he sold. Then he bought low and sold high, again. Within an hour he was up $750 (US). For his third move, he went short, predicting the euro would fall. It did, and he made another $300. It was 4:30 a.m.
“Then I went back to sleep,” says Khan, 62, a civil engineer who made day trading his full-time job after emigrating from Pakistan in 1999.
At 1 p.m., Khan was back in the basement of his modest bungalow. He sold short again, both the euro and the S&P 500 stock index. He called it a day at 2:30 p.m. — $2,935 (US) richer after three hours of trading.
“If you go with the (market) trend, you make money. If the bull is in command, you follow the bull. If the bear is in command, you follow the bear,” Khan explains, referring to the beasts that signify a rising or falling market.
It sounds simple enough, but Khan is part of a relatively small group making money in today’s wildly volatile global markets. Most investors are watching their investments, including retirement savings, evaporate. Although marked by frenetic swings, the overall market tendency is down, some 20 per cent since spring.
“We’ve seen a lot of wealth shed away in the last few months. And the ones who lost it are the people who can’t afford to lose it,” says Eric Kirzner, professor of finance at the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management.
“Ninety per cent of the people lose money,” says Khan, “and the money they lose goes into the pockets of the 10 per cent making money.”
This lopsided formula rings true to many these days. It partly explains the anger of protesters “occupying” Wall Street for the past three weeks. It might also explain why recent statements on the BBC by an unknown trader — Goldman Sachs rules the world; traders dream of market turmoil and recession — went viral.
“He was honest and forthright in the most scary way,” Rotman’s dean, Roger Martin, says of Alessio Rastani. “This guy was absolutely correct. What he said is, ‘traders like us couldn’t care less whether the economy is doing well or badly. . . all that has to happen is for there to be volatility.’”
There’s nothing of the vulture in Khan. He’s the soft-spoken father of five children who warns against greed and never risks more than $900 in leveraged currency contracts. Yet he too gets a rush from the kind of volatility that has many fearing they’ll never afford retirement.
“I love it,” he says.
The small group of winners in today’s market is largely made up of professional traders selling financial products the uninitiated wouldn’t understand, like index futures, or buying bear market exchange-traded funds. They are people making short-term trades while riding the market’s ups and downs.
“High frequency trading is all the rage now,” says Dave Poxon, 45, a day trader in Whitby.
Poxon says “click traders” — buying and selling with a click of the mouse — can’t keep up with those, like himself, who use algorithms to ride the volatility. He said he and two colleagues made a total of about $5,000 to $6,000 (US) a day last week using an algorithm he designed.
There’s no clearer sign of the profitability of volatility than HBP S&P 500 VIX Short-Term Futures Bull Plus, an exchange-traded fund (ETF). It was the most profitable mutual fund on the Toronto Stock Exchange during the last three months, its value rising an eye-popping 178 per cent.
The leveraged fund doesn’t buy and sell stock. It simply tracks the performance of the VIX Index — known by insiders as the Fear Index — which measures the volatility of U.S. stocks. The more volatile the market, the more money it makes.
“Volatility has been a very lucrative asset class to be invested in,” says an official with Horizons BetaPro, which manages the ETF. The official, who didn’t want to be named, stressed the fund isn’t for typical, long-term investors: “If the market isn’t volatile, you would lose gads of money on that ETF.”
Martin argues that big players are increasingly counting on market volatility. He points especially to hedge funds, which in 2008 controlled $2 trillion of assets in the U.S.
In theory, hedge funds reduce risk by placing bets in opposite directions. They should therefore make money no matter which way the market goes. But the way most hedge fund managers get paid magnifies the theory to the extreme, Martin argues.
Managers are paid according to the “2 and 20 formula” — 2 per cent of the assets they manage plus 20 per cent of the increase they generate. Big paycheques are made when markets shoot up or down.
“The more back and forth the better,” Martin says.
As the market swings, the incentive is to “roll the dice” and make a killing. If the bet turns out wrong, the manger has lost other people’s money — including, perhaps, a pension fund’s — yet still walks away with the 2 per cent fee. If the trade works, the millions or billions of dollars the fund earns is at the expense of other investors or companies because the market is a zero sum game, Martin says.
Either way, Martin argues that hedge fund managers are getting filthy rich without adding value or jobs to the economy. He calls it “the very biggest problem with the economy now.”
Sometimes the action raises allegations of crime. Canadian insurer Fairfax Financial Holdings Ltd. is suing a group of hedge funds, accusing them of spreading false information to drive down its stock and then profit through short-selling. (In short selling, a trader borrows shares to sell, hoping to buy them back later at a lower price. If that happens, the trader settles the loan and pockets the difference.)
Short sellers make money when stocks go down, which explains their reputation as vultures. Kirzner argues they help create an efficient market by moving stocks where they belong, pointing to the recent decline in share price of Research in Motion — maker of the BlackBerry — as an example.
It’s a game many are playing now, but one with a history of dire warnings. The legendary short-seller Jesse Livermore made millions betting short when stock markets crashed in 1929. But he lost as many fortunes as he made. In 1940, after throwing back two drinks, he walked into the cloakroom of a swanky Manhattan hotel and blew out his brains.
Fawad Khan isn’t playing for high stakes. He’s happy making what he describes as a decent living.
He was introduced to the stock market while working as a contractor in Pakistan. He built a home for a businessman who was so grateful he gave Khan a quick course on trading.
In Canada, he realized that contracting work involved the same kind of “palm greasing” it did in Pakistan. So he gave it up, studied trading and for the past nine years has been focusing on buying and selling currencies.
“It’s beautiful work,” he says. “I can do it any time I want. No business will give you that freedom.”
He says most days a handful of people will join him in his basement and copy his trades. He doesn’t charge them, unless they get hooked and want to take a course he gives now and then. He urges them to trade with a “stop loss” of $50 or $100 — if you lose that much, stop trading.
“The people who know this business, they make money. The people who are greedy, the people who have fear, they lose money.”
So what should a cautious trader do these days?
“Keep selling the euro short,” he says. “Short selling is good advice.”
Unless you’re Jesse Livermore, of course.
Big winners
Canada’s top performing mutual funds and ETFs over the last three months:
HBP S&P 500 VIX Short-term Futures Bull Plus: up 178.7%
HBP S&P 500 VIX Short Term Future: up 87.0%
HBP COMEX® Gold Bullion Bull Plus ETF: up 39.6%
Friedberg Global Macro Hedge (US$): up 29.8%
HBP S&P/TSX Energy Bear Plus ETF: up 28.0%
The Bank of England surprised markets Thursday by sanctioning another 75 billion pounds ($116 billion) injection into a British economy that’s suffering from the shockwaves of Europe’s debt crisis and the British government’s austerity program.
The Bank’s rate-setting Monetary Policy Committee said it was reviving a program of asset purchases which injected 200 billion pounds in between March 2009 and January 2010 to help lift Britain out of a deep recession. The hope is that by buying government bonds from banks, they will use their cash injection to lend to hard-pressed businesses and households.
The scale of the asset purchases, which will take four months to complete, was more than anticipated by those predicting Thursday’s move. Most economists thought the Bank would opt to wait until November before deciding on a more moderate 50 billion pound injection.
“It is clearly an indication of the extent to which the MPC is worried about the slowdown that it has chosen to act so soon and so decisively,” said Peter Dixon, economist at Commerzbank.
In a statement, the nine members of the MPC said the pace of global expansion has slackened, especially in Britain’s main export markets _ a reference to the eurozone, which is mired in a debt crisis that’s beginning to impact on banks’ day-to-day activities.
“Vulnerabilities associated with the indebtedness of some euro-area sovereigns and banks have resulted in severe strains in bank funding markets and financial markets more generally,” the panel said. “These tensions in the world economy threaten the U.K. recovery.”
Though the eurozone economy is also showing increasing signs of heading back into recession, the European Central Bank opted to keep its main interest rate unchanged at 1.5 percent. Many in the markets had been predicting a cut.
While launching another round of so-called quantitative easing, the Bank of England’s panel left the base lending rate at an all-time low of 0.5 percent and said that inflation would likely undershoot the 2 percent target in the medium term in light of the deteriorating outlook. It’s currently running at 4.5 percent and likely to go above 5 percent in the next month or two on the back of higher utility bills, the panel said.
“In the light of that shift in the balance of risks, and in order to keep inflation on track to meet the target over the medium term, the committee judged that it was necessary to inject further monetary stimulus into the economy,” the panel said.
The pound slumped soon after the announcement, trading 1.1 percent lower at $1.5293 as investors were caught unawares by the surprisingly big increase.
Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit, said the decision was not without risk but would bolster the economy “until European policymakers can find a resolution to the region’s sovereign debt crisis and the U.K. government outlines a coherent strategy for growth.”
The Bank acted a day after revised data showed that the British economy grew by only 0.1 percent in the second quarter, half the previous estimate. It managed little or no growth in the previous six months.
American economist Adam Posen has been alone among the nine Monetary Policy Committee members to vote last month for another 50 billion pounds in asset purchases, but minutes of that meeting signaled a shift in sentiment with “most members” agreeing that the case for more stimulus had strengthened.
With the base rate at an all-time low of 0.5 percent and the government cutting spending, quantitative easing is the only remaining big lever to jolt the economy to life.
Two million homes and businesses were without power early Sunday as Hurricane Irene slammed into the East Coast and charged north.
Winds of up to 115 miles per hour whipped across the Eastern Seaboard, ripping power lines from poles and snapping trees in half. Hospitals, emergency call centers and other crucial facilities were holding up, but officials said it could get much worse as Irene churns north.
Gasoline supplies were falling as drivers fill up before leaving town or just top off their tanks as a precaution before the storm hits. Pump prices rose about 3 cents per gallon overnight in New Jersey and Pennsylvania.
Dominion Resources reported outages for more than 900,000 of its customers in Virginia and North Carolina, while Progress Energy reported 190,000 customers without power.
Duke Energy said 1,500 customers were in the dark. Pepco, which serves Maryland, Washington D.C., parts of New Jersey and Delaware, reported nearly 80,000 outages. Baltimore Gas & Electric said nearly 250,000 of its customers were without power.
In eastern Pennsylvania, PECO reported nearly 140,000 customers without power.
New York’s biggest utility, Consolidated Edison, said it could cut power to the city’s most vulnerable areas if the storm causes serious flooding. Salt water and rain can damage electrical equipment.
ConEd operations chief John Miksad said the utility doesn’t expect to cut power before the storm hits, but flooding Sunday could bring a shutdown to areas including the southern tip of Manhattan. That would cut off power to major Wall Street institutions through parts of next week.
The New York Stock Exchange has backup generators and can run on its own, a spokesman said. The exchange expects to open as usual Monday morning, though it may change plans depending on the severity of the storm.
New York is regularly blasted by winter storms, but Miksad said this hurricane will be different. Irene’s wind will pack a stronger punch than a nor’easter last March that knocked out power to 175,000 customers, he said.
ConEd has called in crews from as far as Colorado to help repair damage from the storm.
Irene is expected to be a brutal test for Middle Atlantic States, which haven’t seen a hurricane since 1999. The storm is expected to stay just offshore _ and thus retain much of its power _ as it inches up the coast from North Carolina to New England. When a hurricane hits land, wind speeds diminish.
The entire Eastern Seaboard lies in the storm’s projected path. Flooding and damage from winds are likely. North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut and Rhode Island have declared emergencies. For the first time, New York City ordered people in low-lying areas to evacuate.
Power companies have called in several hundred workers from surrounding states to help. Crews were rushing out between bands in the hurricane, when the wind and rain ease. They’re looking for damage first at towering transmission lines, where an outage could put an entire county in the dark.
The storm has already caused gasoline supplies to fall as refueling barges wait out the storm off the coast. Widespread power outages could lead to fuel shortages as gas stations are no longer able to pump gas or have trouble replenishing their own gas supplies.
“Power is the lifeblood of oil supply on the East Coast,” said Ben Brockwell of the Oil Price Information Service, which tracks gasoline shipments around the country.
Some gas stations in New Jersey reported that they’d run out of fuel. Those shortages could become more widespread.
Retail gas prices were mostly unchanged in many cities that are expected to be hit this weekend. Rules against price gouging at gas stations took effect throughout Middle Atlantic states. Authorities will be looking for stations that try to take advantage of panicked drivers.
Pump prices were up slightly overnight, as much as 3 cents per gallon, to $3.44 in Philadelphia and $3.49 in New Jersey’s Atlantic-Cape May metro area. They seemed to hold in other areas, rising a penny or so on average in Maryland, Virginia and the Carolinas.
The Colonial Pipeline, which transports gasoline and other fuels from the Gulf Coast to the Northeast, stopped fuel deliveries to Selma, N.C., and to Virginia’s Tidewater area as the storm knocked out power. Pipeline spokesman Steve Baker said the pipeline may cut off deliveries further in Virginia and Maryland as the storm moves north.
Refineries, which make fuel from oil, have started to slow operations as Irene approaches.
OPIS says East Coast refineries will cut operating rates 10 to 25 percent in the next few days. Refineries in the Gulf Coast and the West should be able to keep supplies flowing to the rest of the country.
Refineries along the Louisiana Coast produce more than three times the gasoline and fuel of their East Coast counterparts, according to the Energy Information Administration. East Coast demand is going to fall as businesses close and people hunker down at home.
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