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Economy in Brief
U.S. Index of Leading Indicators Fell Again in July
The Conference Board's Composite Leading Economic Indicators Index fell 0.4% m/m...
U.S. Philly Fed General Activity Index Back to Positive Reading in August
The current general activity diffusion index rose nearly 19 points in August to 6.2...
U.S. Unemployment Claims Slightly Lower
Initial claims for unemployment insurance went down 2,000 in the week ended August 13 to 250,000...
Inflation Rages in EMU and Hovers Globally
Inflation in the European Monetary Union in July finalizes at 8.8% year-over-year...
U.S. Retail Sales Hold Steady in July; Nonauto Sales Rise
Total retail sales remained unchanged during July (10.3% y/y)...
Viewpoints
Commentaries are the opinions of the author and do not reflect the views of Haver Analytics.
by Tom Moeller August 20, 2007
The National Activity Index (CFNAI) from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago fell back in July to -0.10 after a brief move into positive territory during the prior month.
The Chicago Fed indicated that the production & income category made a positive contribution to the index. They were offset by negative contributions in the employment, the consumption and housing category. The sales, orders, and inventories category made a neutral contribution in July.
The three-month moving average of the CFNAI also fell back into negative territory where it has been now for eleven months.
A zero value of the CFNAI indicates that the economy is expanding at its historical trend rate of growth and during the last twenty years there has been a 68% correlation between the level of the CFNAI and q/q growth in real GDP.
The CFNAI is a weighted average of 85 indicators of economic activity. The indicators reflect activity in the following categories: production and income, the labor market, personal consumption and housing, manufacturing and trade sales, and inventories & orders.
The complete CFNAI report is available here.
Chicago Fed | July | June | July '06 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
CFNAI | -0.10 | 0.06 | 0.02 | 0.02 | 0.28 | 0.32 |