Economy in Brief

For new or existing home sales, December was a bleak month. Following Monday's report that existing home sales dropped sharply, the Commerce Department reported today that new home sales fell 7.6% m/m to 342,000 from an upwardly [...]

Belgium is a small open EMU economy that tends to lead the way in the Euro-business cycle. It is headed higher once again in January. The chart above shows that the Belgium MFG index usually surges early and peaks ahead of the indices [...]

NABE indicated in its latest Industry Survey that despite level demand throughout last year, most other economic conditions firmed. The index of unit demand improved sharply as 2010 began, but momentum waned as the year progressed. [...]

EMU orders rise, but beware the optimism EMU orders rose in November more than expected. A lot is being made of the much smaller Yr/Yr drop which now at -4.1% compares to the -12.1% reported last month (not shown in the table). But [...]

The firm uptrend in the Conference Board's Index of Leading Economic Indicators continued last month with a rise of 1.1% following an upwardly revised like gain in November. It was the ninth consecutive monthly increase and the 10.8% [...]

The firm uptrend in the Conference Board's Index of Leading Economic Indicators continued last month with a rise of 1.1% following an upwardly revised like gain in November. It was the ninth consecutive monthly increase and the 10.8% [...]

The American Bankers Association indicated last week that loan delinquencies across all types of credit have fallen. Delinquencies in most categories have declined moderately, in some they're down dramatically. Economic recovery [...]

As the ECB is holding policy steady and ECB president, Jean Claude Trichet, is telling us that the expansion will be moderate but uneven, the Markit PMI’s are giving us some really mixed news that makes The Trichet comments look [...]