Economy in Brief: July 2010

For June, weakness in durable goods orders was widespread. The advance figures from the Commerce Department indicated a 1.0% decline in orders overall, similar to May's 0.8% drop which was slightly shallower than reported initially. [...]

The GfK group, a market research company headquartered in Nuremberg Germany, released data from its July survey of the German consumer today. Based on the opinions of some 2000 individuals, GfK found a marked improvement in the German [...]

The Conference Board indicated that consumer confidence continued its recent decline this month. Their consumer confidence index fell 7.2% m/m to 50.4 following a 13.4% June decline that was slightly less than reported initially. The [...]

Consumers seem willing to spend even though we've seen a souring in sentiment and confidence. Chain store sales rose 0.6% last week after the prior period's 1.4% jump. Together, these increases pulled sales for the month 1.9% above [...]

The pump price for regular gasoline moved three cents higher last week to $2.75 per gallon. That remained down after an upturn through early-May to $2.90. Pulled higher by firm demand, prices have risen from the late-2009 level of [...]

Modest improvement in home prices again was apparent during May. Too much should not be made of it, however, since "improvement" means stability after earlier declines. Seasonally adjusted, the Case-Shiller Home Price Index inched up [...]

India is experiencing high inflation in contrast to China and South Korea, as can be seen in the first chart that shows the year over year percentage changes in the consumer price indexes of the three countries. The financial crisis [...]

Any real improvement in housing has yet to show itself. The Census Department indicated that new home sales last month rose 23.6% from May to 330,000. However, the rise followed a sharper May decline following the end to the Federal [...]