Economy in Brief: January 2020

Initial claims for unemployment insurance declined 7,000 to 216,000 during the week ended January 25. Claims were down 11.5% from a year ago. The previous week's figure was revised up to 223,000 from 211,000. The Action Economics [...]

The Federal Reserve kept the target range for the Federal funds rate at 1.50%-to-1.75% at today's FOMC meeting. The lack of action was expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. The decision was unanimous amongst FOMC voters. [...]

Germany's consumer confidence is projected to strengthen in February by the GfK survey as the climate gauge rises to 9.9 from 9.7 in January. The 9.9 reading is its strongest since June 2019 when it stood at 10.1. The top reading on [...]

U.S. pending home sales fell 4.9% (+4.6% y/y) during December, according to the National Association of Realtors (NAR). The shortfall was the second in the last three months. During all of 2019, the average index level of 105.7 was [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that its Mortgage Loan Index increased 7.2% during the week of January 24 following a 1.2% dip in the prior week. Applications were two-thirds higher than one year earlier. Applications to [...]

Retail gasoline prices fell to $2.51 per gallon (+11.1% y/y) in the week ended January 27 from $2.54 per gallon in the previous week. This was the third consecutive weekly decline and the lowest price since the week ended March 11, [...]

The Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index eased slightly in December, by 0.2% to 126.5........ The Consumer Confidence data are available in Haver's CBDB database. The total indexes appear in USECON, and the market expectations [...]

The advance reading for November indicated that durable goods orders fell 2.0% m/m (-3.7% y/y) following a 0.2% m/m rise in October, revised down from 0.6%. A 1.5% increase had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. [...]