Daily Treasury Statement

The US Daily Cash Deficit for 8/28/2013 was $10.6B bringing the August 2013 deficit through 28 days to $133B with two business days remaining. $12B of Social Security payments went out today…the last payment of the month, bringing August 2013 and 2014 as close to in sync as they have been all month. Revenues are back down YOY $2B under last year’s pace, but there is a good chance they will catch back up tomorrow as a few $B of excise taxes are likely to trickle in. Outlays are also down $10B, resulting in the deficit being down $9B(rounded) vs last year. Without a doubt…improvement is a good thing…we’ll take it…but this kind of meager improvement is substantially less than we have become accustomed to seeing.

So…with two days to go…expect a small deficit for Thursday, followed by a large Friday deficit…likely in the $30-$40B range as September payments get pulled into August by the timing of the weekend and the Labor Day Holiday. Thanks to the holiday, we won’t have our final August numbers until next Tuesday 9/3, but I don’t mind waiting.

The Us Daily Cash Deficit for 8/27/2013 was $5.9B bringing the August deficit through 27 days to $122B with three business days remaining. Revenues have finally pulled even to August 2012’s pace at $179B…likely on track to edge out August 2012’s $204B of revenues by a few billion or so.

With three days left…August is looking like a big disappointment…with flat revenues, and adjusted for timing, more or less flat cost….where we are really looking for +10% revenues and 1-2% reduction in outlays to match earlier month’s performances. This would make two in a row…though we should probably average them together….I’ll do that once the finals are in. Obviously…if August ends like that…it won’t be a good thing, but September Revenues is what I am most interested in. Quarter ends are always stronger in revenues….and subject to more uncertainty. If we see solid YOY revenue gains across the board…it will be good news…or at least more of what we’ve seen over most of 2013. If…however, revenues disappoint for the third month in a row, it will be a pretty good sign that trouble’s a brewin…and the pony ride that the first half of 2013 has resembled is just about over.

The US Cash Deficit for 8/23/2013 was $1.8B bringing the August 2013 Deficit through 23 days to $119B. Revenue pulled to within $1B of last years pace with five business days to go. Getting to the +20B needed for 10% YOY gains doesn’t look like it is going to happen this month…absent some revenue surprise, but we’ve seen those before.

Outlays look like they are showing a $24B improvement…but the final social security payment that goes out Wednesday should wipe out about $12B of that. My $155B estimate for the August deficit is starting to look a bit conservative. Monday will likely post a small surplus…followed by moderate deficits Tuesday-Thursday, and a large deficit Friday, perhaps $30-$40B as payments due 9/1 are made a day early…

The US Cash Deficit for 8/21/2013 was $7.7B and the cash deficit for 8/22/2013 was $5.4B, bringing the August 2013 deficit through 22 days to $117B.

In the past two days…revenue made a few baby steps forward, but with six business days remaining in the month remains $3B behind the pace set by August 2012.

The US Cash Deficit for 8/20/2013 was $7.1B pushing the August 2013 deficit though 20 days back over $100B to $104B with 8 business days remaining.

After a couple days of gains, Revenues stepped back…losing $1B of ground with 2012, settling at $-4B with 8 business days remaining. Outlays continue to run about $10B under last year after adjusting for the timing of Social Security with the most apparent cuts still in Defense Vendor Payments and Education Department programs.

So…with 8 business days left, I see no reason to change the monthly deficit forecast I started with at $155B. There is some significant uncertainty regarding the month end where payments due 9/1 (Saturday) will be paid 8/31…I am guessing $35B, but I don’t have a good enough handle on it to nail it down. So…We are still on track for $155B+/- $10B…I think 🙂