Economy in Brief: June 2012

New orders for durable goods rebounded 1.1% in May following a 0.2% dip in April (last month reported as unchanged). The Consensus forecast was for a 0.5% rise. Despite May's gain, the y/y increase continued to decelerate to 4.6% [...]

Indicators of Consumer Confidence for France and Germany were released today. In Germany, GfK's Consumer Climate indicator declined from the March high of 6.0 points to 5.7 points in May and June but is now forecasting an improvement [...]

The Conference Board's June Index of Consumer Confidence Index fell for the fifth month this year. It declined 3.7% to 62.0 from 64.4 last month, initially reported as 64.9. Nevertheless, the index remained up by more than half from [...]

Earlier pressure on home prices has given way to an improving trend. The seasonally adjusted Case-Shiller 20-City Home Price Index rose another 0.7% (-1.9% y/y) during April. That repeated its March rise, revised up from 0.1%. The [...]

Weak demand for petroleum products continued to depress prices last week.The pump price of regular gasoline declined nine cents to $3.44 per gallon. Since early April prices have fallen fifty cents (-12.8%). Haver Analytics' [...]

In spite of signs of weakness in the Brazilian economy in the last two years, Brazilian consumer confidence kept increasing up through April of this year. The main measure of Consumer Confidence, the Getulio Vargas Foundation (FVG) [...]

The housing market is on the mend. New home sales jumped 7.6% in May to 369,000 following a 1.2% April decline. However, March sales were revised up. May sales beat consensus expectations for 346,000. A one-third rise (127.8% y/y) in [...]

The May National Activity Index (CFNAI) from the Chicago Federal Reserve dropped to -0.45 from a revised 0.08 in April, reported as 0.11 last month. Moreover, the three-month moving deteriorated to -0.34, its lowest reading since June [...]