$$ Rail Traffic Remains Steady

Total N. American rail traffic held steady at the 680k-690k level last week. When you couple this with results and the outlooks from both Dow and DuPont for the coming quarter, we should not expect this to fall anytime soon (barring the typical end of year nose dive). What I do find odd is that rail traffic is a proven indicator of economic activity yet its rise (and continued growth of economic activity) is being ignored by the bears. If we drill down into the numbers reported by the rail companies, they are all saying they are seeing increased demand in all areas EXCEPT housing. The point here is that housing, while being embraced by the bears is NOT slowing down the economy into a retraction, it is impeding the rate of growth and those are two very different things.

We are still seeing growth and will continue to see it into 2011.