Economy in Brief: January 2008

For early January, the University of Michigan's consumer sentiment index recovered 6.6% m/m to 80.5, the highest level since October.The increase was only the second in eight months and it beat expectations for a continued decline to [...]

Yr/Yr EMU import growth is now exceeding export growth. Import growth is creeping up at a faster pace while export growth is being damped and is faltering. But sequential growth rates within the past year shows that most components [...]

Unexpectedly, initial claims for jobless insurance dropped 21,000 last week to 301,000 after an unrevised 12,000 decline during the week prior. The latest level was the lowest since late September and contrasted with expectations for [...]

The Philadelphia Federal Reserve Bank reported that it's Index of General Business Conditions in the manufacturing sector cratered to -20.9 this month from what was a revised level of -1.6 in December. The latest level was the lowest [...]

Not since the recession of the early 1990s have housing starts fallen so low. A 14.2% m/m decline in December dropped starts to 1.006 million units after a downwardly revised 7.9% November decline. The decline, which by far exceeded [...]

Not since the recession of the early 1990s have housing starts fallen so low. A 14.2% m/m decline in December dropped starts to 1.006 million units after a downwardly revised 7.9% November decline. The decline, which by far exceeded [...]

For January, the Composite Housing Market Index from the National Association of Home Builders' (NAHB) remained low versus a December reading that was revised up slightly. The index was stable in the Northeast (-47.4 % y/y) but fell [...]

Industrial production was unchanged last month, a bit better than the expected slight decline. That followed an unrevised 0.3% November rise. For all of last year, the 1.6% increase in output was the weakest since 2003. The latest [...]