Apple is upending the traditional (x86) CPU markets.
It is doing this by offering the same M1 chip in laptops, tablets and desktop PCs.
The same M1 chip at all price points (from $699 to $1,699).
“Apple’s willingness to position the M1 across so many markets challenges the narrative that such a vast array of x86 products is helpful or necessary. It puts Intel and AMD in the position of justifying why, exactly, x86 customers are required to make so many tradeoffs between high performance and low power consumption. Selling the M1 in both $699 and $1,699 machines challenges the idea that a computer’s price ought to principally reflect the CPU inside of it.“
“This graph shows existing home months-of-supply (from the NAR) vs. the seasonally adjusted month-to-month price change in the Case-Shiller National Index (both since January 1999 through February 2021).“
Simply put if inventory is high prices decline, if months of supply is low they rise.
Months of supply in March is 2.1. Prices are rising strongly.
“Observation of history also supports the notion that the saving rate is unlikely to sharply undershoot its pre-pandemic value. Consider the experience around World War II. During the war, the saving rate spiked as production and purchases of consumer goods and spending on leisure services were curtailed. At the conclusion of the war, despite the release of pent-up demand as returning service members married and started families, the saving rate declined to a level above its pre-war average and then trended higher for several years. Our forecast features a broadly similar result. The return of the normal relationship between spending, income, and wealth does not imply an undershoot of the saving rate. Without such an undershoot, the path of consumer spending, while strong, does not launch the economy into an inflationary boom.“
Seemingly in the face of this and this, venture has quietly been funding semiconductor start-ups since 2017.
Partly this is an explosion of AI (especially edge AI), and new use cases (biology, quantum computing) but also the interest of big tech firms in acquiring semiconductor startups.
A really brilliant interview with Enrico Moretti, a researcher in labour and urban economics.
He makes two points on the future of post-pandemic cities, which, due to agglomeration effects he sees as bright.
There will be two forces – the first as employers accept some working from home, workers will accept a longer commute if it is less frequent, thereby growing the size of cities and hence the amenities they support.
This process will also lighten the load on the urban core – thereby making it more attractive.
