Economy in Brief

Mortgage applications continue their swoon. The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that total applications for a home mortgage fell another 2.6% last week (-44.5% y/y). Since early-May applications are down 45.1%. Last week's [...]

Housing starts during June fell 9.9% to 836,000 (+10.4% y/y) and reversed their May improvement to 928,000, initially reported as 914,000. The decline disappointed expectations for improvement to 950,000 starts in the Action Economics [...]

Global factory order trends are not exactly calling out the global fire department to quell the blaze of growth. But the chart above clearly shows that there is a lull in the rate of decline of orders for the US, Germany and even [...]

The expectations index of the ZEW survey backed off to 36.3 in July from 38.5 in June. One year ago the index stood at -19.6. Current index continued to advance rising to 10.6 from 8.6 in June. While markets were mostly unnerved by [...]

The International Council of Shopping Centers and Goldman Sachs reported that chain store sales declined 1.1% last week (+1.7% y/y) but remained near the record high. So far in July sales are 3.5% above the June average after two [...]

The Composite Housing Market Index from the National Association of Home Builders-Wells Fargo jumped 6 points to 57 this month following a 7 point advance in June. The latest rise was to the highest level since January 2006 and [...]

Industrial production grew 0.4% during June following a 0.1% May slip, earlier reported as +0.1%. A 0.3% rise had been expected in the Action Economics survey. Factory sector production edged up 0.2% (1.7% y/y) following a 0.3% [...]

All of a sudden the cost of living has jumped. The consumer price index surged 0.5% in June (1.8% y/y) after a 0.1% May uptick. It was the firmest rise since February and beat expectations for a 0.3% increase. Prices excluding food [...]