Economy in Brief: September 2011

German retail sales took a sharp turn lower in August. Vehicle registrations were lower as well. Real retail sales excluding autos fell sharply in August as well. Nominal retail ex-auto sales are actually on a modest accelerating [...]

The University of Michigan's Index of Consumer Sentiment for all of September rose to 59.4. That's versus its mid-September reading of 57.8 and versus August of 55.7. Regardless, that gain still left the Q3 average down sharply at [...]

A one-month decline and a trend slowdown characterize the recent behavior of personal income. It fell 0.1% during August following a revised 0.1% July uptick, initially reported as 0.3%. A 0.1% gain was expected. Disposable income [...]

Real GDP growth was revised back up to 1.3% (SAAR) from the 1.0% reported a month ago. The change was powered by a higher estimate of growth in domestic final sales. Consensus estimates had called for GDP growth of 1.2%. The upward [...]

The decline in the Euro-Area is quite plain and clear for all to see. The graph above plots index levels and shows how even those (like Germany) with a strong recover yare falling fast. Spain, the weak economy on the chart also shows [...]

The National Association of Realtors (NAR) reported that pending sales of existing single-family homes fell 1.2% last month and repeated the July drop that was unrevised. Sales remained slightly higher than the Q2 average but remained [...]

The job market may be on the mend.Initial claims for jobless insurance dropped a sharp 37,000 to 391,000,000 last week from 428,000 (revised from 423,000). The latest figure was the lowest since the first week of April and was far [...]

German export and import prices are each falling in August. Excluding petroleum, both export and import prices fell. But over three months export prices are rising and import prices are falling both with and without petroleum prices. [...]