Economy in Brief: November 2020

• Crude oil prices increase. • Natural gas prices edge lower. • Gasoline prices are little changed. The price for a barrel of West Texas Intermediate crude oil increased to an average of $40.79 per barrel (-28.4% y/y) in the week [...]

Housing starts in Canada rose in October after a sharp drop in September when multi-unit activity backed off sharply. The increase in starts is attributed to single-detached urban starts which dominated some slight weakness in urban [...]

• Business inventory accumulation strengthens. • Sales growth also remains firm. • Inventory-to-sales ratio remains at six-year low. Total business inventories rose 0.7% (-4.7% y/y) during September following an unrevised 0.3% August [...]

• Oil prices fall again, but some other imports also decrease. • Export prices were mixed with total up 0.2%. Import prices edged down 0.1% in October (-1.0% y/y) after rising 0.2% in September, which is revised from 0.3% reported [...]

• Consumers barely lift spending following five months of strong increases. • Spending slowdown widens. As the number of coronavirus cases increased, total retail sales including food service & drinking establishments improved just [...]

• Industrial production increased 1.1% in October with upward revisions to both August and September. Still, production is 5.6% below its pre-pandemic February level.• Manufacturing led the rebound, rising 1.0% in October with upward [...]

• Diffusion index rises to record high 90 in November. • All three subcomponents -- present and forward-looking sales as well as foot traffic -- all increase to records. • Three out of four regions improve, only exception Northeast. [...]

Something missing. Federal withheld gross income tax receipts continue to post large declines, missing the rebound in employment and wage and salary income. One wonders if the weakness in gross federal income tax receipts is related [...]