Insights

The same borrowers, the same market, a 28 point gap in whether the cost landed as expected. That difference is produced by process, which means it can be closed without touching price.

One advance takes 10 to 20 percent of daily receipts. Two or more take 30 to 40. Each funder assessed the file in front of it, and the position that kills the merchant exists only across files.

Utilization across law firms averages 37 percent against a 70 percent benchmark for an effective firm. It climbs with headcount, which tells you exactly what the constraint is.

July housing starts fell 12.4 percent on the month and 13.5 percent on the year, with builder confidence at 35 for a sixteenth straight month. Sector exposure arrives as many separate problems.

Accounting enrollment rose 8.9 percent to 205,180, a third straight increase. Graduates fell 6.6 percent and new CPA exam candidates dropped from 42,626 to 28,082 over the same stretch.

July retail sales fell 0.6 percent against an expected rise, and categories ranged from minus 2.2 to plus 1.9 in the same month. Receipts are both the slowest signal a lender has and the least specific.

Employment in nondepository credit intermediation has fallen 22.3 percent from its 2021 peak and is still declining, while the share of small business applicants going to online lenders rose to 29 percent.

Across 509 professional services organizations, billable utilization fell to 66.4 percent, the lowest on record, while revenue growth improved and generative AI reached 27.1 percent of projects.