Economy in Brief: February 2014

Consumer prices nudged 0.1% higher (1.6% y/y) during January following a 0.2% December rise. The increase matched consensus expectations in the Action Economics survey. Consumer prices excluding food and energy also gained 0.1% [...]

The price for a gallon of regular gasoline prices increased to $3.38 (-9.8% y/y) last week but remained down versus the $3.78 per gallon peak reached in February of last year. Haver Analytics constructs seasonal factors to account for [...]

The Producer Price Index underwent major revision this month. It now includes prices for final demand of goods, services and construction as well as a reading of intermediate demand prices. The overall final demand PPI rose 0.2% in [...]

The Greek merchandise trade deficit slipped deeper into red-ink territory in December, falling to 1.5 billion euro from a 1.3 billion euro deficit in November. At this point it's not clear what we would consider as truly good news for [...]

Housing starts in January declined 16.0% (-2.0% y/y) to 880,000 units (AR) from 1.048 million in December, revised up from 999,000. The latest level fell short of expectations for 950,000 starts in the Action Economics survey. Starts [...]

Heavy snowfall this month depressed the Composite Housing Market Index from the National Association of Home Builders-Wells Fargo by 10 points versus January to 46. The m/m decline was the largest in the series history and the index [...]

The ZEW German index for February shows a significant climb in the current index as expectations were set back for the second month in a row, this time substantially. The current index rose to 50 this month from a level of 41.2 in [...]

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York indicated that its Empire State Factory Index of General Business Conditions for February fell to 4.48 from its two year high of 12.51 during January. The latest figure fell short of expectations [...]