Economy in Brief: April 2020

• The foreign trade deficit in goods and services fell significantly. • Imports fell sharply while exports slipped. The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services narrowed to $39.93 billion in February from $45.48 billion in January, [...]

Initial jobless claims for unemployment insurance were 6.648 million (3,051% year-on-year) in the week ending March 28. The Action Economics Forecast Survey mean was 3.250 million claims while its median was 2.900 million; the [...]

• The foreign trade deficit in goods and services fell significantly. • Imports fell sharply while exports slipped. The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services narrowed to $39.93 billion in February from $45.48 billion in January, [...]

• The foreign trade deficit in goods and services fell significantly. • Imports fell sharply while exports slipped. The U.S. trade deficit in goods and services narrowed to $39.93 billion in February from $45.48 billion in January, [...]

• • • The value of construction put-in-place grew a greater-than-expected 1.8% in January (6.8% year-on-year)....... The construction spending figures, some of which date back to 1946, as well as and US Population-Weighted Heating and [...]

Of the eighteen observations on manufacturing PMIs in Table 1, only two entries China and Taiwan improve month-to-month (India and Mexico are ‘unchanged on the month because we use their data from February to fill out the table since [...]

• Broad-based component declines led by fewer new orders. • Pricing power falls sharply. • Most readings move below the break-even level of 50. Activity in the factory sector weakened just slightly last month despite the onset of the [...]

• Construction spending fell 1.3% higher in February after jumping 2.8% in January. • A return to more somewhat more seasonal weather in February after a very warm January likely played a role. The value of construction put-in-place [...]