Economy in Brief

Initial claims for jobless insurance increased to 254,000 (-8.3% y/y) in the week ended September 24 from 251,000 in the prior week, revised from 252,000. The figure remained near the lowest level since October 1973. The four-week [...]

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) reported that pending home sales fell 2.4% during August (-0.2% y/y) following a 1.2% rise, revised from 1.3%. These sales are reported as an index with 2001=100. The August value of 108.5 [...]

Economic growth during Q2'16 was revised higher to 1.4% (SAAR, 1.3% y/y) from 1.1% estimated last month and 1.2% in the advance report. A 0.8% gain had been expected in the Action Economic Forecast Survey. Business fixed investment [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that its total Mortgage Market Volume Index fell 0.7% last week (+23.9% y/y) to the lowest level since late June. Refinancing applications were off 1.6% (+34.0% y/y) and added to the prior [...]

New orders for durable goods were fairly stable during August (-1.3% y/y) following a 3.6% July increase, revised from 4.4%. A 1.4% decline had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. Orders for transportation equipment [...]

Germany's look-ahead consumer confidence indicator from GfK sees a drop in confidence in October. The setback is small, taking the monthly reading to 10.0, from September's 10.2, which has been the cycle as well as the all-time high. [...]

The Conference Board reported that's its Consumer Confidence index increased 2.3% (1.5% y/y) to 104.1 during September following a 5.3% jump in August. It was the highest level since August 2007. A 1.9% rise had been expected in the [...]

Throw in the kitchen sink, Mario The euro area remains largely unresponsive to all the central bank's efforts to revive it. Mario Draghi in his address to the European parliament's Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee noted that [...]