US DAILY DEFICIT

The US Daily Cash Deficit for Friday 2/14/2014 was $9.5B bringing the February 2014 deficit at the halfway point to $94B.

We have a huge timing issue on the outlay side with the 2/15 interest payment of ~30-35B being included in the 2013 data…but not in 2014 due to our adjustment of the days. With the weekend and the holiday, I guess those didn’t go out until 2/18 (today) in 2014…so we should be synced back up tomorrow.

No huge refund variance today…right around $8B…a little under last year, but same ballpark at least. Revenue down another $1B on the day though timing is clearly part of it…this time corporate taxes, which should sync back up tomorrow.

The US Daily Cash Deficit for Thursday 2/13/2014 was $9.1B bringing the February 2014 cash deficit to $85B…still on track for a $200B+ deficit by month end.

Revenues fall a bit further behind driven in part by $1B in higher refunds and another $2B that looks like the timing of excise taxes that will probably correct itself with the next report….which will be released next Tuesday due to the holiday Monday.

Just for fun, I took a quick look at the 2014 YTD…recall that January actually posted a 9.6% YOY increase in revenues. Adding in the first 13 days of February though, and we’ve dragged it back down to +5.7%. The key to the 2014 deficit is going to be revenue growth….do we end the year at +10%, +5%, or flat? I really don’t know at this point, and we may actually have to wait until June before the crystal ball stars to clear up.

Oh yeah…one last reminder guys…today is Valentines Day….Unless you are on the East Coast, you still have time to pick something up on the way home from work.

The US Daily Cash Deficit for Wednesday 2/12/2014 was $30.4B driven primarily by $22B of tax refunds…blowing away last year’s comparable at only $12B….and pushing 2014 refunds over 2013 by $7B…admittedly with a lot of time left.

So far, not much about this month has been predictable, so I won’t try to read much into one day, but if refunds continue at this pace….it’s going to wipe out a lot of revenue gains. In my model I have refunds forecasted to grow 2%….right now we’re at +14% despite a really slow start. Last year tax refunds bounced around before peaking Wednesday 2/27 at $14B and tapering off well into April.

The US Daily Cash Deficit for Tuesday 2/11/2014 was $8.5B pushing the February 2014 cash deficit to $46B through 11 days.

Refunds looked normal for a change at $4.8B…right in line with last year. Deficit wise, really nothing to see… However…we see more fun “Extraordinary Measures” games that are probably worth pointing out. We see $50.9B of new debt issued. against only $900M of redemptions, leading my calculator to assure me public debt outstanding has increased $50B. And yet…somehow, magically, public debt outstanding has actually decreased by $4.7B. The cash, on the other hand is not imaginary, increasing $42B for the day. That’s a $55B magic trick ladies and gentlemen…feel free to give Lew a round of applause 🙂 .

With the senate now passing the debt limit suspension, we will probably see these shenanigans reversed and the debt pulled back on the balance sheet in the next few days, depending on when the President gets around to signing it. Oh well..it was fun while it lasted.