Explaining Southern California's economy
PHOTOS: Top 10 California business and economics stories of 2012
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Apple introduces the iPhone 5 in San Francisco. It was the first time that the technology juggernaut, the most valuable California company by far, introduced a new device since Steve Jobs' death. Will it be enough to make Apple the world's first $1 trillion company in 2013?
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The Tribune Co., owner of the Los Angeles Times along with dozens of other media properties, finally exited bankruptcy on New Year's Eve. Now the real fun can begin in the City of Angels: Who will buy the hometown paper? Could it be...Rupert Murdoch?
Photo Credit: SpaceX
SpaceX CEO and Chief Designer Elon Musk watches Dragon's progress inside of SpaceX Mission Control in Hawthorne in May. The former PayPal founder whose other company in electric carmaker Tesla Motors put California's space business back on the map — and ushered in a new era of private voyages to the stars. But will he really be able to retire on Mars?
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Disney CEO Bob Iger completes a trip of high-profile acquisitions, beginning with Pixar, then moving on to Marvel, culminating with a purchase of Lucasfilm from George Lucas. "Star Wars" now belongs to the Mighty Mouse — and Episode 7 is on the way! But will Disney be able to inject new life into one of pop cultures iconic entertainment franchises?
Reed Saxon
California was crushed by the housing downturn. But fours years after the bottom fell out, the state's real estate market at last began to show signs of life, as the foreclosure crisis fades and a price bubble even began to form in Southern California. Will the market return to normal in 2013?
Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Time Inc.
Former Google superstar Marissa Mayer took the helm at troubled Yahoo, after a ugly battle between the board of directors and activist shareholder Dan Loeb. Mayer began to make immediate management changes, brought back free food, became one of the most powerful female CEOs on the U.S. — and had a baby! Can she live up to the hype in 2013?
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The battle for the future of online content heated up. In early 2012, Silicon Valley and Hollywood dueled in Washington, D.C., over anti-piracy legislation. Hollywood had the lobbying power, embodied by former senator Chris Dodd and the MPAA. But Silicon Valley won a critical skirmish in the eleventh hour by blacking out Wikipedia for a day. Will the combatants be able to strike a truce in 2013?
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At the tail end of 2013, California's unemployment rate dropped into single digits for the first time since 2009. And compared with the rest of the U.S., the state spent 2012 adding jobs at a brisk clip. But will the recovery be able to sustain its momentum in 2013?
Steven Cuevas / KPCC
San Bernardino fell off its own fiscal cliff in 2012 — and fell fast, declaring bankruptcy quicker than anyone expected. The broke Inland Empire city joined Stockton and Mammoth Lakes in a minor bankruptcy boom in California and set the stage for the municipal bond market's worst nightmare: a long-anticipated wave of defaults in the Golden State. Could that scary event come to pass in 2013?
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It was supposed to be the initial public offering of the century, enriching Facebook employees and investors and reviving a moribund IPO market for high-tech startups. But Facebook flopped in first-day trading and kept on falling in subsequent days. Facebook's lead banker, Morgan Stanley, was blamed for botching the offering. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg went on the defensive. And by year end, Facebook still hadn't recovered it $100 billion valuation. But it topped 1 billion active users before the ball dropped in Times Square to ring on 2013. Will 2013 be the year it bounces back?
This is one in a series of year-end stories that look back at the most memorable pieces KPCC reporters worked on in 2012 and look ahead at a key issue that will be the focus of coverage in the coming year.
How much happened in the Golden State in 2012 when it comes to business? Lots. Lots and lots. The DeBord Report covered most of it.
The slide show above serves up the business year in pictures for the state with the largest economy and two of America's most storied industries: Hollywood and high-tech.
And if you want to review the business year in links to the original posts...well, I've got that covered, too.
10. Apple introduces the iPhone 5 and the iPad Mini — the first all-new gadgets rolled out by Cupertino since the death of Steve Jobs
9. The long, long, LONG Tribune Co. bankruptcy comes to and end. So who will buy the Los Angeles Times?
California real estate market is stranger than it's ever been
That's the takeaway from today's California Association of Realtors Housing Market Forecast for 2013. CAR Chief Economist Leslie Appleton-Young presented the data, and the date is...basically unprecedented. Appleton-Young said that she's never seen a market quite like it.
However, she doesn't think that the market is distorted. You could be excused for thinking that it is. For starters, according the the CAR, prices in California fell almost 60 percent from their bubble highs before the financial crisis. But at the moment, several factors are intersecting. There's not enough supply to meet housing demand in the state. Combined with historically low interest rates, this is pushing up prices. And investors snapping up properties they consider to be historically underpriced are sweeping into the market, using all-cash offers to gobble up homes.
Distressed home sales are declining across Southern California
CAR
Distressed homes sales have been declining in Southern California large counties both year-over-year and month-over-month.
CAR
The supply of homes for sale has been getting tighter and tighter since last year, reducing pending sales but pushing up prices in many cases.
The California Association of Realtors released data on August pending and distressed home sales today — data that shows that the housing market in the Southland and elsewhere in the state is improving to the degree that a lack of housing inventory is becoming a problem.
This could ultimately be a good problem to have, if its spurs builders, such as L.A.-based KB Home, to start constructing new houses. KB beat earnings expectations last week and now seems to be pretty bullish on a housing recovery.
It's also good for sellers, as a shortage of supply is pushing prices up. It's worth noting that market is now clearing the overhang of distressed properties, a process that we've been waiting for particularly in hard-hit California. As you can see from the charts above, distressed sales — short sales and foreclosed properties, or "REOs" ("real estate owned") — have been falling year-over-year and month-over-month is Los Angeles, Riverside, and San Bernardino counties.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein discusses economy, foreign affairs, taxes, and politics at Town Hall Los Angeles
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Sen. Dianne Feinstein, at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles, speaks at a Town Hall event.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein sat down with Mark Baldassare, CEO of the Public Policy Institute of California, in front of a packed lunchtime audience today at the Millennium Biltmore Hotel in Downtown Los Angeles. The two discussed economic challenges facing the U.S., the Occupy Wall Street movement, tax reform, and political gridlock in Washington, D.C.
"If you elect people who want to solve problems, you can get something done," Feinstein, who has been representing California for nearly 20 years in Congress, stated. "If you elect people who pound the table, you can't get anything done."
Feinstein, a Democrat, followed this indictment of Republican intractability by pointing out that she considers it unlikely that the remaining aspects of President Obama's jobs bill will pass, including a provision that would establish an national infrastructure bank, still to be voted on.
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