Economy in Brief

Personal consumption expenditures edged 0.1% lower last month (+3.6% y/y) following an unrevised 0.4% June increase. It was the first decline in six months. A 0.2% rise had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. When [...]

The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City reported that its August Composite index of 10th District factory sector activity deteriorated to 3, the lowest level since December. The composite index is an average of the production, new [...]

Initial claims for jobless insurance during the week ended August 23 slipped to 298,000 from 299,000 in the prior week, revised from 298,000. The latest figure compared to expectations for 300,000 claims in the Action Economics [...]

Pending sales of single-family homes jumped 3.3% (-2.1% y/y) during July, according the National Association of Realtors (NAR), following a little-revised 1.3% June decline. The increase was to the highest level since last August. [...]

The economic recovery garnered more strength than estimated earlier. The second GDP estimate for Q2 indicated a 4.2% rate of growth, revised up from 4.0%. The gain followed a 2.1% Q1 decline and beat expectations for 3.9% growth in [...]

The EU Commission indices for August have their EU and EMU headlines and sector headlines available, but country detail is only available for a few early reporters rather than for the full set of EMU members. The economic sentiment [...]

Following a muted performance during all of last year, the cost of food is again leading consumer prices higher. During the last twelve months, the consumer price index for food has risen 2.6%, well ahead of nonfood price inflation of [...]

Germany's consumer climate rating for September fell to 8.6 from 8.9 in August. The drop is the first since January 2013. The climate reading fell by 0.3 percentage points, which is the largest drop since May 2011 (more than three [...]