Economy in Brief: 2018

Germany's factory orders in October rose instead of falling as expected, but the gain was only of 0.3% and it reflected widely different results on domestic vs. international orders. Foreign orders rose by 2.9% in October while [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that its total Mortgage Applications Index rose 2.0% (-16.6% y/y) during the week ended November 30 following a 5.5% rise during the prior week. Applications to refinance a mortgage [...]

Gasoline prices fell to an average $2.45 per gallon (-2.0% y/y) from $2.54 during last week. Prices have fallen from an average high of $2.90 early last month, to the lowest level since December 2017. Haver Analytics constructs [...]

Sales of light vehicles eased 0.2% (-0.8% y/y) during November to 17.49 million units (SAAR), but remained near the highest level in twelve months. Passenger car sales declined 4.8% (-14.5% y/y) last month to 5.37 million units and [...]

The value of construction put-in-place eased 0.1% (+4.9% y/y) during October. The weakening was the same as in September, revised from no change. It followed a 0.4% August decline, revised from +0.8%. A 0.4% increase had been expected [...]

The ISM composite index of business activity in the factory sector increased to 59.3 during November after a decline to 57.7 in October. A reading of 57.5 had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. During the last ten [...]

The National Association for Business Economics projects 2.7% growth in real GDP during 2019, unchanged from the prior forecast in June. That follows an expected 2.9% rise this year, revised from the earlier forecast of 2.8% growth. [...]

The National Association for Business Economics projects 2.7% growth in real GDP during 2019, unchanged from the prior forecast in June. That follows an expected 2.9% rise this year, revised from the earlier forecast of 2.8% growth. [...]