Economy in Brief: September 2015

Gasoline prices at the pump continued to fall last week and averaged $2.38 per gallon (-30.3% y/y). That was down 6 cents from a week earlier and below $2.84 in mid-June. Haver Analytics constructs factors adjusting for the seasonal [...]

Overall industrial output decreased 0.4% during August after a 0.8% July gain, last month reported as 0.6%. A 0.2% decline had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. Manufacturing sector production fell 0.5% (+1.3% [...]

The Empire State Factory Index of General Business Conditions remained negative during September, nearly the weakest reading since the recession. The latest figure of -14.67 compared to an unrevised -14.92 in August. These diffusion [...]

The ZEW expectations reading, the part of this report that gets the headline, fell to 12.1 in September from 25.0 in August, better than halving its value. ZEW expectations have dropped more than this in one month only about 8.5% of [...]

Overall retail sales including food services & drinking places during August increased 0.2% (1.6% y/y). A 0.3% rise had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. July's 0.7% gain and June's slight decline were little [...]

Only moderate improvement in U.S. economic activity combined with weakness in the rest of the world provided little support to crude materials prices last month. The industrial commodity price index from the Foundation for [...]

Consumer prices in Italy are very well-behaved. The HICP headline rose by 0.1% in August as the core was flat. The domestic CPI fell by 0.1% in August. Italy's 12-month inflation is 0.5%; the core measure is up by 0.9%; the domestic [...]

The U.S. Treasury Department reported a $64.4 billion budget deficit during August, half the $128.7 billion deficit during August of 2014. An $84.0 billion deficit had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. Because [...]