Economy in Brief: 2009

Though sales of new homes rose 6.2% to 430,000 last month, the gain followed two months of decline. In all, new home sales have risen nearly one-third from the January trough and the October figure exceeded Consensus expectations for [...]

The job market continued to improve last week. The Labor Department reported that initial claims for unemployment insurance fell to 466,000 from a downwardly revised 501,000 during the prior week. The latest level was the lowest since [...]

Negative job growth continued to minimize personal income growth last month. Personal income gained 0.2% during October after an upwardly revised like increase in September. The latest figure matched Consensus expectations. While the [...]

Negative job growth continued to minimize personal income growth last month. Personal income gained 0.2% during October after an upwardly revised like increase in September. The latest figure matched Consensus expectations. While the [...]

Overall business confidence in Germany and in France improved slightly in November. Confidence in both countries, however, is still subdued. In Germany, confidence is measured in two ways: (1) as a percent difference between the [...]

Euro-Area orders are still falling year-over-year. As the chart shows the Yr/Yr drop is being steadily mitigated. Both foreign-sourced orders and domestic orders (in-region orders) are rebounding smartly after their recession-induced [...]

As they have since June, gasoline prices moved sideways last week. The pump price for regular gasoline of $2.64 per gallon was near $2.63 averaged during June. Nevertheless, prices remain up from the December low of $1.61. This week, [...]

Consumers were distressed this past winter. Malaise is the best word to describe consumer confidence since then. The Conference Board indicated that consumer confidence during November rose just 1.6% from October following sharp [...]