Economy in Brief: 2010

The recent volatility of oil prices has dominated the monthly ups and downs of U.S. import prices. During October there was a clear upward influence as there has been through this year. Import prices jumped 0.9% last month following a [...]

This latest figure covering labor market conditions indicates improvement after last week's deterioration. Initial claims for unemployment insurance dropped sharply last week to 435,000, the lowest level since early-July. That [...]

Like peas in a pod...NOT! -- Despite the similarity in their overall cyclical behavior very different forces are afoot in the Italian and French industrial sectors. Trends in France - French consumer spending is blowing through hot [...]

The September U.S. foreign trade deficit improved to $44.0B following its little-revised deterioration to $46.5B during August. The figure was narrower than expectations for $45.0B. For all of Q3 the deficit averaged $44.4B versus [...]

Japan's Economy Watcher's index fell in October as the bottom fell out of the current conditions index. That index is now in the bottom 60th percentile (top42 percentile) of its High/Low range. By queue some 70% of the values for the [...]

Manufacturing in the Netherlands accounts for about 15% of total Real Gross Value Added, but 57% of the Gross Value Added by the goods producing sectors. Data on new orders, turnover and production in manufacturing are available in [...]

Stability has turned toward an upward move amongst energy prices. The pump price for regular gasoline rose to $2.87 per gallon last week, up six cents w/w and up nearly twenty cents since early-September. Prices rose from the [...]

Reversing the earlier indication of labor market improvement, the Bureau of Labor Statistics indicated in its Job Openings & Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) that the September job openings rate fell to 2.2% from a downwardly revised [...]