Economy in Brief: 2017

Nonfarm payrolls increased 261,000 (1.4% y/y) during October following an 18,000 September increase and a 208,000 August gain. Together these two figures were revised up by 90,000. A 318,000 increase in payrolls had been expected in [...]

Dots represent quarterly confidence points; the line connects dots since the report has become monthly. Japan's consumer confidence moved up to 44.5 in October form 43.9 in September. It was last stronger in September 2013. And then [...]

Initial claims for unemployment insurance declined to 229,000 (-12.2% y/y) during the week ended October 28 from 234,000 in the prior week, revised from 233,000. The Labor Department indicated that the number of claims continued to be [...]

Output per hour in the nonfarm business sector grew at a 3.0% annual rate (1.5% y/y) in the third quarter following an unrevised 1.5% Q2 gain. It was the quickest productivity increase in three years. A 2.4% rise had been expected in [...]

Total sales of light vehicles declined 2.6% during October (+1.2% y/y) to 18.09 million units (SAAR) from 18.57 million in September, according to the Autodata Corporation. Nevertheless, sales remained near the highest level since [...]

At today's meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, the target for the federal funds rate was left unchanged at 1.00%-1.25%. This was the third consecutive meeting at which the rate target had been held steady with the last rate [...]

Of the 18 countries/regions in the table, 13 showed weaker readings in October than in September. However, only Mexico and Malaysia logged a manufacturing sector reading below 50 (indicating an outright contraction in output). There [...]

The value of construction put-in-place rose 0.3% (2.0% y/y) during September following a 0.1% uptick, revised from 0.5%. No change in activity had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. Private sector building activity [...]