Economy in Brief: July 2016

New orders for durable goods fell 4.0% during June (-6.4% y/y) following a 2.8% May decline, revised from -2.2%. A 1.0% shortfall had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. For a second straight month, weakness in the [...]

The Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index of 97.3 during July stayed close to 97.4 in June, revised from 98.0. The latest figure remained nearly the highest level since October and beat expectations for a decline to 96.0 in the [...]

Housing market improvement continued during June. Sales of new single-family homes increased 3.5% (25.4% y/y) to 592,000 (SAAR) from 572,000 in May, revised from 551,000. Sales of 557,000 had been expected in the Action Economics [...]

There is no rest for the weary. Japan may be tired of weak prices, but the weakness is not letting up. In June the overall PPI was flat month-to-month, keeping the PPI lower over 12 months by 4.3% and falling at a -3.9% annualized [...]

Regular gasoline prices declined to $2.18 per gallon last week (-20.5% y/y). Prices were down five cents from the week earlier and were 22 cents lower than early last month, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Prices are lower [...]

U.K. optimism fell sharply in the Q3 CBI industrial trends survey by the Confederation of British Industry. The better-minus-worse (or up-minus-down) index of expectations fell to -47, a figure that has been this low or lower only 5% [...]

The Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas indicated that its industrial activity in the state was little-changed during July, ending sharp declines since early last year. Its General Business Activity index rose to -1.3 this month from -18.3 [...]

The decline in the overall U.S. unemployment rate has stabilized this year, averaging 4.9% versus 5.3% during 2015. It still was half its late-2009 peak, and great variation amongst individual states continued. In today's state labor [...]