Category Archives: Economic Indicators (USA)

Economic data which effects interpretation of economic health

April 2013 Producer Price Index Shows Almost No Year-over-Year Growth

Written by Steven Hansen The Producer Price Index year-over-year inflation is disappearing.. The BLS reported that the Producer Price Index (PPI) finished goods prices year-over-year inflation rate fell from 1.1% in March to 0.6% in April 2013 – with the … Continue reading

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What Do Weekly Unemployment Claims Tell us About Recession Risk?

by Doug Short, Advisor Perspectives/dshort.com Note from dshort: I’ve updated this commentary to include the latest labor force data in May’s release of the April employment report. Every Thursday I post an update on weekly unemployment claims shortly after the … Continue reading

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Export / Import Price Deflation in April 2013

Written by Steven Hansen In April 2013, year-over-year price deflation continues in import prices for 11 of the last 12 months . Export price price are also deflating this month: with imports down 0.5% month-over-month, down 2.6% year-over-year and exports … Continue reading

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Retail Sales Stay Right on Trend but Economists Get It Wrong Again

by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner Retail sales grew modestly and on trend in April. There was no evidence of either a slowing economy or one that is overheating and about to cause conventional inflation measures to move higher. At … Continue reading

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March 2013 Business Inventories and Sales Continues to Show Little Improvement

Written by Steven Hansen Econintersect‘s analysis of final business sales data (retail plus wholesale plus manufacturing) for March 2013 is closer to the headline data. business sales with this month’s data is continuing to trend less good (positive growth, slower … Continue reading

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Retail Sales Stronger than Expected in April 2013

Written by Steven Hansen Retail sales came in much stronger than anticipated. the unadjusted data was stronger than the seasonally adjusted data this month; the headline numbers show backward revisions were slightly upward; the weakness in the data was gasoline … Continue reading

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Housing Smoke and Mirrors (5) – “Zombie Fed”

Written by Adam Whitehead, KeySignals.com In Housing Smoke and Mirrors (4), it was suggested that the bad eggs in the 2005 and 2009 Mortgage Vintages were hatching; and creating a growing systemic threat. Click to enlarge The Federal Reserve and … Continue reading

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US Consumers Keep Spending Despite Reduced Pay

by Warren Mosler This article was originally published by Mosler Economics (Apr. 29, 2013) This is the current thinking, but the pieces don’t add up? Hoping I’m being too negative here… Comments below:

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Using the Jobs Report To Forecast the Economy

Written by Steven Hansen It continues to amaze me of the love affair between Wall Street and the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) employment situation report – aka the Jobs Report.  It is nearly a worthless data set in real … Continue reading

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Bubbly Stock Prices Running Away From Improving Jobless Claims

by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner The trend toward fewer initial unemployment claims continued this week at a pace near the best levels of the past several years. However, spurred on by QE, bubbling stock prices are increasingly ahead of … Continue reading

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Country Income Shares in PPP

by Jayati Ghosh, Triplecrisis.com The UNDP’s latest Human Development Report 2013 (entitled “The rise of the South”) has one particularly striking chart that it uses to make the point about the recent growing economic significance of some “emerging” nations. In … Continue reading

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Austerity and Growth Perspectives: Europe, the IMF, China, and the US

by Elliott Morss, Morss Global Finance A version of this article appeared in DW, 08 May 2013. Introduction Over the last two decades, the trade-offs between more rapid economic growth and the need for governments to keep their financial houses … Continue reading

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March 2013 Wholesale Sales Contraction Continues

Written by Steven Hansen March 2013 wholesale sales and inventories data continues to go up one month, down the next. This data series is very noisy, and suffers from data gathering anomalies as well as poor headline methodolgy. This analysis … Continue reading

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More Bad News On Dying US Manufacturing

More Bad News On Dying US Manufacturing- Excise Taxes Drop, But Markets Have Reason To Party On by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner [While US tax collections on everything went gangbusters in April, absolutely through the roof, there was one … Continue reading

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March 2013 Consumer Credit Growth Weaker Than Expected

Written by Steven Hansen The headline said: Consumer credit increased at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 5-3/4 percent during the first quarter. Revolving credit was little changed, while nonrevolving credit increased at an annual rate of 8 percent. In … Continue reading

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March Factory Order Rebound Doesn’t Change Dismal Trend

by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner New factory orders (actual, adjusted for inflation and not seasonally adjusted), which is a broader measure than durable goods orders because it includes non-durables, dropped 3.3% on a year to year basis in March. … Continue reading

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March 2013 JOLTS Suggests A Static Employment Situation

Written by Steven Hansen The BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (JOLTS) has been a good predictor of future jobs growth: the number of PRIVATE jobs openings – which is the most predictive of the JOLTS elements – was … Continue reading

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Housing Smoke and Mirrors (4) – “The Zombie in the Room”

Written by Adam Whitehead, KeySignals.com In Housing Smoke and Mirrors (3)[i] it was suggested that there were some anomalies, in the general pattern of improving mortgage delinquencies, that deserved closer scrutiny.

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Payrolls Gain But QE Has No Impact On Growth Rate

by Lee Adler, Wall Street Examiner The BLS today reported a seasonally adjusted (SA) gain of 165,000 in April nonfarm payrolls, beating the consensus estimates of 140,000 to 155,000 from surveys of economists by mainstream media organizations. Surprise, surprise (not) … Continue reading

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April 2013 Conference Board Employment Index Improves Marginally

Written by Steven Hansen The Conference Board’s Employment Trends Index – which forecasts employment for the next 6 months – rose marginally in its April 2013 release. The Conference Board believes their index continues to signal moderate employment growth; Econintersect‘s … Continue reading

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