Economy in Brief

Japan's economy is losing momentum again. Despite a pledge to get inflation back to 2% and an aggressive program of quantitative easing, the economy is losing momentum. The Japanese government downgraded its overall economic [...]

The Federal Reserve's financial accounts data (formerly known as the "flow of funds") for Q2 show total credit market borrowing at $2.32 trillion annual rate, up from $1.56 trillion in Q1. That earlier period is revised from $2.00 [...]

The Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank reported that its General Business Conditions Index for September edged down to 22.5 from 28.0 in August. Despite the decline, the figure remained near the highest point since March 2011. It [...]

Initial claims for jobless insurance fell to 280,000 during the week ended September 13 from 316,000 in the prior week, revised from 315,000. The Action Economics Forecast Survey expected 305,000 in the latest week. The four-week [...]

Housing starts during August slumped 14.4% to 956,000 AR (+8.0% y/y) following a 22.9% July jump to 1,117,000, revised from 1,093,000. The latest level missed expectations for 1,035,000 starts in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. [...]

U.K. nominal retail sales growth bounced back in August, rising by 0.2% after a 0.3% July decline. The sequential growth rates of retail sales have been extremely steady over three months, six months and 12 months around and just [...]

The U.S. current account deficit decreased in Q2'14 to $98.5 billion from $102.1 billion in Q1.The deficit amounted to 2.3% of GDP, roughly the same as during all of last year. The Action Economics Forecast Survey called for a deficit [...]

The Composite Housing Market Index from the National Association of Home Builders-Wells Fargo jumped to 59 during September from an unrevised from 55 in August. The latest figure was the highest since November 2005 and beat [...]