M. Holland is exhibiting during the WAI Operations Summit & Wire Expo on June 7-8 in Dallas, Texas. This event focused on wire and cable manufacturing offers industry forecasts, technical presentations, networking and more. Join us at Booth #621 to learn more about our supply solutions for wire and cable.
Nick Chodorow has joined M. Holland as Chief Innovation Officer. In this role, Nick will lead efforts to enhance the company’s technology platforms and accelerate its digital journey. Click here to read the full press release.
M. Holland will be closed Monday, May 30 for the Memorial Day holiday.
Supply
Oil prices jumped 3% Thursday to a two-month high. In mid-morning trading today, WTI futures were down 0.5% at $113.50/bbl, Brent was down 0.1% at $117.30/bbl, and U.S. natural gas was down 3.1% at $8.62/MMBtu.
Demand for gasoline in mid-May fell to one of its lowest levels for this time of year in nearly a decade, new data shows. U.S. households are now spending the equivalent of $5,000 a year on the fuel, up from $2,800 a year ago.
Duke Energy is set for a battle with South Carolina regulators, who rejected the company’s plans to shut down six remaining coal-fired power plants a decade earlier than originally planned in its pursuit of zero net emissions.
OPEC+ will likely stick to a 432,000-bpd output boost for July when the group meets next week, rebuffing Western calls for a faster increase to control prices.
The U.S. is now putting more combustion byproducts to beneficial use than it is discarding, the first time in data going back to 2008:
More oil news related to the war in Europe:
Hungary is pressing for about $800 million to upgrade its refineries and expand a pipeline from Croatia before it agrees to an EU embargo on Russian oil.
Europe is hitting roadblocks in complex negotiations to replace Russian gas with supply from the Middle East and North Africa.
The White House released lease terms for offshore wind projects that would place hundreds of turbines and some 4.5 GW of capacity off California’s coast.
Daily operations at Shanghai’s port have rebounded to 95.3% of capacity, while the port’s cargo backlog remains high at 260,000 TEUs. The data aligns with other indications that seaborne cargo volumes from China to the U.S. ticked up this month.
The U.S. reported 118,954 new COVID-19 infections and 338 virus fatalities Thursday. There were roughly 108,000 new daily infections over the last week, up 28% from two weeks ago, while fatalities hovered near the lowest levels of the pandemic at 300 per day.
Hawaii has the highest per capita rate of COVID-19 in the nation.
U.S. consumers expect current high inflation to moderate and to be down to a 3% annual rate in five years, according to a new Fed survey. The U.S. inflation rate decelerated in April to 6.3% from 6.6% in March, while consumer spending jumped 0.9%.
Initial U.S. jobless claims fell by 8,000 last week to 210,000, a bigger drop than expected and a signal of continued tightness in the labor market.
The average U.S. mortgage rate fell to 5.1% this week, the lowest in a month.
U.S. pending home sales slumped 3.9% in April, falling for the sixth month in a row.
Home listings rose 9% last week as sellers worry that they may miss out on the booming market. Roughly 20% of sellers dropped list prices over the previous four weeks.
Discount retailers Dollar General and Dollar Tree saw better-than-expected quarterly earnings, a reversal from disappointing results at big-box stores such as Target and Walmart.
Japan yesterday reopened its borders to tourist groups but not individual travelers for the first time since early 2020 and doubled its cap on overseas arrivals to 20,000 per day.
New research suggests asymptomatic carriers of COVID-19 are about 68% less likely to pass the virus on than those who get sick.
Economists predict Africa’s GDP will rise just 4.1% this year compared to 6.9% in 2021.
Canadian job openings hit a record-high of over 1 million in March.
Profits at China’s industrial firms fell 8.5% last month, the quickest decline in two years.
Taiwan lowered its estimate for GDP growth this year to 3.9% from the 4.4% it forecast in February.