Economy in Brief: December 2017

France's INSEE index shows that the industry climate has backed off in December to a reading of 112.1 from 112.8 in November. Despite the drop, it is still a strong reading. In fact, it is stronger than every reading previous to [...]

Economic growth was revised to 3.2% (AR, 2.3% y/y) during Q3'17 from a 3.3% second estimate released last month. It was the strongest growth since Q1'15. Expectations had been for 3.3% growth in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that its total Mortgage Applications Volume Index fell 4.9% last week (-8.0% y/y) following a 2.3% drop during the prior week. Purchase loan applications fell 5.5% (+0.8% y/y) following a 1.1% [...]

The National Association of Realtors reported that sales of existing homes increased 5.6% (3.8% y/y) to 5.810 million (AR) during November. It was the highest level of sales since December 2006. The rise followed a little-revised 2.4% [...]

The EMU current account and trade surpluses contracted in October with the current account falling to 30.8 billion euros from 39.15 billion euros and the trade surplus falling to 19.0 billion euros from 24.5 billion euros. The balance [...]

The U.S. current account deficit narrowed sharply to $100.6 billion during Q3 2017 from $124.4 billion in Q2. It was the smallest deficit in three years. The Q3 deficit figure compared to $116.8 billion expected in the Action [...]

According to an old expression, 'trees do not grow to the sky.' In that spirit, it can't be 'surprising' that despite strong growth and solid improving conditions in the German economy, the IFO index stepped back this month. Only [...]

Retail gasoline prices fell to $2.45 per gallon (+8.2% y/y) last week, down for the fifth straight week. Haver Analytics constructs factors adjusting for the seasonal variation in gasoline pump prices. At $2.74 per gallon, the [...]