Economy in Brief

Nonmanufacturing activity rebounded last month following two months of decline. The Institute for Supply Management's (ISM) composite nonmanufacturing index rose to 59.3 from 57.1 in October. The figure nearly reached its August peak [...]

The manufacturing and services sectors for EMU are weakening and are staying on their recent trends as they do so. Conditions are weak and headed to get weaker. While there are many distortions in the global economy there are also [...]

Hiring growth in November continued on a par with earlier months, according to the ADP/Moody's National Employment Report. Private sector employment grew 208,000 last month following a 233,000 October increase, revised from 230,000. [...]

Sales of light vehicles improved 5.6% y/y to 17.20 million units (SAAR). Purchases were up 4.5% versus October when they totaled 16.46 million, little-changed from the prior month. Purchases of light trucks recovered 6.3% (9.6% y/y) [...]

The value of construction put-in-place recovered 1.1% (3.3% y/y) during October following a 0.1% September slip, revised from -0.4%. Despite the latest gain, forward momentum continued to fade. The increase exceeded expectations for a [...]

Euro-Warfare: The EMU PPI is down by 1.4% year-over-year. Yet all the stories out of Europe are about the European Central Bank and whether it can launch a quantitative easing program or whether that will be blocked. And while the [...]

The price for a gallon of regular gasoline fell to an average $2.78 last week (-15.1% y/y) versus $2.82 during the prior week. Prices remained down versus $3.65 reached in June. To account for seasonal patterns, Haver Analytics [...]

The manufacturing sector on a global basis is expanding in November with five reporting entries contracting (two of them ensconced in the euro area, which itself expanded, but slowed) while 10 showed manufacturing PMI values above 50. [...]