· Purchase applications fell 9.5% (+11.4% y/y) to the lowest level in a month after a 3.9% decline the week earlier. Applications to refinance dropped 15.5% w/w (-53.2% y/y).

·  During the last ten years there has been a 54% correlation between the y/y change in purchase applications and the change in new plus existing home sales.

· The effective interest rate on a conventional 30-Year mortgage reversed all of the prior week's rise and fell to 6.03%. The effective rate on a 15-year mortgage similarly reversed course and fell to 5.44%.

· The Mortgage Bankers Association surveys between 20 to 35 of the top lenders in the U.S. housing industry to derive its refinance, purchase and market indexes. The weekly survey accounts for more than 40% of all applications processed each week by mortgage lenders. Visit the Mortgage Bankers Association site here.

· Mortgage delinquencies as reported by the Mortgage Bankers Association fell in 3Q03 to 4.28%, the lowest level since 3Q 2000. The percentage of loans entering foreclosure rose to 0.38%, near the record high.

12/05

11/28

2002

2001

2000

·  The last recession appears milder than initially estimated, with the economy down 0.5% rather than the previously estimated 0.6%.

· Corporate profits in 2002 were revised up substantially due to a change in the treatment of stock options. Profits of domestic industries as a percentage of gross domestic income were 7.1% versus 6.3% estimated earlier.

·  Savings were revised sharply lower beginning in 1987 because personal spending was higher than previously thought and personal income was revised down.

· Price inflation was revised higher last year due to a raised estimate of prices (deflation eliminated) for nonresidential structures and slightly more inflation in the prices of residential structures. Other price series were little revised except that more deflation is now estimated in the prices of equipment & software in 2001.

· Visit the Bureau of Economic Analysis for the latest on the comprehensive revisions to the National Income and Product Accounts, which date back to 1929, at this location.

2002

2001