Economy in Brief: August 2015

Global economic weakness is causing a pronounced decline in industrial commodity prices. The industrial commodity price index from the Foundation for International Business and Economic Research (FIBER) deteriorated last month by [...]

The euro area showed some progress for its private sector in August. The EMU PMI advanced to 54.1 from July's 53.9. It's hardly a rousing gain, but it keeps some sense of upward momentum in the indicator. In August the EMU [...]

The Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank reported that its General Factory Sector Business Conditions Index for August improved to 8.3 following an unrevised decline to 5.7 in July. Expectations were for 6.5 in the Action Economics [...]

The Conference Board's Leading Economic Index fell 0.2% in July after June's 0.6% increase; the latter was unrevised from the initial report. The Action Economics Forecast Survey had foreseen a 0.2% rise. July's reversal put the [...]

Sales of existing homes strengthened 2.0% during July to an annualized 5.590 million (11.7% y/y) from 5.480 in June, revised from 5.490 million. Sales remained at the highest level since February 2007 and were stronger than consensus [...]

The German PPI has reversed its course to higher rates of expansion to go dead flat in July. Manufacturing producer prices are flat. Ex-energy the manufacturing PPI is up by 0.1%. Indeed, over three months, the PPI is falling and [...]

The job market continues to expand. First time claims for unemployment insurance rose to 277,000 (-7.9% y/y) during the week ended August 15 from 273,000 in the week earlier, initially reported as 274,000. The four-week moving average [...]

The Mortgage Bankers Association reported that its total Mortgage Market Volume Index increased 3.6% last week (20.4% y/y) to the highest level in three months. Applications to refinance increased 7.2% (21.2% y/y) as interest rates [...]