Economy in Brief

Nonfarm payrolls grew 113,000 (1.7% y/y) during January following gains of 75,000 and 274,000 during the prior two months, initially reported as 74,000 and 241,000. The rise disappointed expectations for a 185,000 increase. Earlier [...]

Germany, already with the largest current account surplus in the world, has posted a barely smaller trade surplus in December compared to November. In December both exports and imports shrank, with exports falling a bit faster. Year- [...]

Nonfarm payrolls grew 113,000 (1.7% y/y) during January following gains of 75,000 and 274,000 during the prior two months, initially reported as 74,000 and 241,000. The rise disappointed expectations for a 185,000 increase. The [...]

Nonfarm business sector productivity grew 3.2% last quarter (1.7% y/y) following its 3.6% Q3 rise. The gain beat the 2.5% expectation in the Action Economics survey. For all of last year productivity rose 0.6%, down from the 1.5% rise [...]

The outplacement firm of Challenger, Gray & Christmas reported that job cut announcements increased to 45,017 (11.6% y/y) during January and reversed the prior month's decline. Layoffs increased m/m the retail, financial, [...]

The U.S. foreign trade deficit deteriorated to $38.7 billion during December compared to a revised $34.6 billion in November, last month reported as $33.4 billion. A $36.0 billion deficit had been expected in the Action Economics [...]

In December, German orders fell by 0.5%. Foreign orders rose by 0.4%, a deceleration from November's 2.3% gain. The real culprit in the weakness of orders, however, is domestic demand. German domestic orders fell by 1.6% in December [...]

Initial claims for unemployment insurance matched expectations and declined to 331,000 (-8.3% y/y) during the week ended February 1. That's versus 351,000 during the week prior, revised from 348,000. It was the first decline in three [...]