It will take YEARS to rebuild the areas affected by Sandy.
Short term there will be a lot of plywood and osb trucks sold just to board up buildings that will eventually be demolished.
For example, the Mouse river flooded Minot, ND two July’s ago. There were hundreds(not thousands)of houses condemmed.
They are still working on rebuilding those houses. Also, New Orleans and Mississippi are still under construction after Katrina and that was 6 years ago(I think).
The trader sitting behind me just sold 6 trucks of OSB into a customer in the mid atlantic area. ALL retailers and distributors of sheathing plywood and osb are getting wiped out of their existing inventory.
Another thing I noticed was a big section of the boardwalk in Atlantic City is gone. That means that some lumber retailer in NJ is going to get an order for half a dozen or more trucks/containers of Brazilian IPE decking.
There are thousands of people that will need temporary housing. FEMA will be ordering trailers from somebody.
State Farm, Allstate, and other home owners insurance companies will be writing more checks than the insurance premiums will bring in the next quarter.
These are just a few of the items I can think of off the top head that will be affected by Sandy.
I can
This is the old “Hurricane Andrew ended the recession” canard from the early 90’s.
“All those Grrrrrrreeeedy insurance companies were forced to cash-out all those funds they had been HOARDING and put that money in ciculation”.
Robert Reichhhhhh releasing column along these lines in 3......2........1.......