Some things of note

The September auto sales figure totaled 16.39mm with the pull forward of EV buying ahead of the $7,500 tax credit expiration apparent as seen with the Tesla numbers yesterday. That compares with 15.77mm in September 2024 but is still below the 17.19mm seen in September 2019 as affordability remains an issue here too with the average vehicle price approaching $50,000.

Conagra, the largest producer of frozen foods in the US, along with a snacks business that includes beef jerky (Slim Jim) and popcorn, talked about its consumer on Wednesday, and a cheap stock we own:

“As we look to the balance of the year, we expect inflationary pressure and weak consumer sentiment to persist.”

“Looking ahead, we continue to navigate a challenging environment as we’re still dealing with persistent inflation and tariffs, both of which have drifted higher than our original expectations. Our previous outlook for core inflation was approximately 4%, but that has moved slightly higher, primarily due to increased costs in animal proteins such as beef, pork, and turkey.”

“On tariffs, while we still expect our gross exposure to be approximately 3% of cost of goods sold, changes to country specific tariff rates have nudged our estimate higher. Our larger exposures to steel, aluminum and China-related tariffs are unchanged.”

“Combined, our total inflation was previously approximately 7% but has now nudged higher to be in the low 7% range.”

And here is more on the consumer, “I think you’re probably hearing the same thing from just about everybody in consumer packaged goods on this. It is kind of this barbell economy where you’ve got higher income consumers that are showing more resiliency and they’re still spending. You’ve got lower income consumers across different age groups that are being more discerning. They are absolutely doing what they’ve got to do to kind of maximize their household balance sheet. So we’ve got to deal with that. But clearly, there is more value seeking behavior that is evident in the lower income group...So going forward, we’ll continue to put that value lens on our innovation and marketing efforts because it matters.”

This is what RPM, a $7.4 billion revenue company selling specialty coatings, sealants, and building materials said on tariffs in their earnings call Wednesday: