Economy in Brief: January 2015

At today's meeting of the Federal Open Market Committee, the Fed reaffirmed its prior view that the U.S. expansion is continuing at a "solid pace." Strong job growth and a low unemployment rate were boosting consumer spending, aided [...]

The overall U.S. unemployment rate in December of 5.6% stood at its six-year low and remained down from 10.0% at the late-2009 peak. Variation in the level of unemployment amongst individual states continues, but a declining trend is [...]

German consumers in February are feeling great, according to GfK. German confidence is on the rise and consumer climate is on a new high in February, according to the forward-looking GfK measure. The rest of Europe is struggling. [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that their total Mortgage Market Volume Index edged down 3.2% last week (+34.9% y/y) following the near-doubling during the prior three weeks. Applications to refinance retreated 5.1% (+58.4% [...]

Average gasoline prices declined another 3 cents in the week ended January 26 to $2.04 per gallon, the lowest level since April 2009. Prices have fallen by more than one-third during the last year and by nearly one-half since their [...]

The Conference Board's consumer confidence index improved to 102.9 during January from 93.1 in December, revised from 92.6 (1985=100). It was the highest level since August 2007. The latest figure increased by more than one-quarter [...]

New home sales during December increased 11.6% to 481,000 (AR) from 431,000 in November, initially reported as 438,000. The latest figure was the highest since June 2008 and pulled the average sales volume for last year to 437,000, [...]

New orders for durable goods declined 3.4% during December (+0.3% y/y) following a 2.1% November drop, revised from -0.7% reported initially. The latest decline was the fourth in the last five months. A 55.5% collapse (-64.5% y/y) in [...]