Economy in Brief: May 2004

Chain store sales rose another 0.3% last week on top of a 1.5% gain the prior period, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC)-UBS. Sales began the month of May 1.7% above the April average. During the last [...]

The Czech Republic, Denmark, Greece, Norway and Slovakia released Consumer price indexes for April. Since most of the data are seasonally unadjusted, year over year changes are shown in the following table for the first four months of [...]

The Index of Leading Indicators for the Major Seven OECD Countries suggested further economic growth with a 0.3% gain in March and a 0.3% February rise which was revised from the initial 0.1% uptick. March marked the twelfth [...]

Employment in Canada rose by nearly 50,000 in April, rebounding from two monthly declines. The job gain helped push the unemployment rate down 0.2% to 7.3%, the lowest since September 2001. The rate had peaked at 8.0% in December 2001 [...]

Non-farm payroll growth in April of 288,000 surpassed Consensus expectations for a 175,000 rise. It was accompanied by upward revisions to payroll gains in both the prior two months. Since payrolls began rising last September the [...]

Factory orders in Germany eased in March by 0.5%, but maintained their relatively high levels of the prior five months and extended a mostly rising trend into an 11th month. German data are classified according to the origin of the [...]

Initial claims for jobless insurance fell 25,000 last week to 315,000, the lowest level since October 2000. Consensus expectations had been for a decline to 338,000 claims. Claims during the prior week were revised up slightly. The [...]

The Euro-Zone Purchasing Managers Index for the service industries remained basically steady in April at 54.54, compared with March's 54.40. Employment gained, notably, and new business edged higher. But expectations eroded, perhaps a [...]