Have new home sales made a bottom? – by New Deal democrat Hopefully you are recovering from your turkey coma today. Here’s a little late commentary on Wednesday’s new home sales report. New home sales are noisy, and heavily revised, which is why I prefer housing permits, and especially single family housing permits, as a […]
Jobless claims have a poor week, rising to multi-month highs – by New Deal democrat Initial claims for jobless benefits rose 17,000 this week to 240,000, a 3 month high. The 4 week average also rose by 5,500 to 226,750. Continuing claims one week ago rose 48,000 to 1,551,000, the highest number since March: While […]
More on deteriorating tax withholding receipts and jobs reports – by New Deal democrat I have a new post up at Seeking Alpha, laying out all of the short leading indicators, and concluding conditions have now been met for a recession to begin at any point in the next 6 months. There’s one graph I intended […]
Coronavirus dashboard for Thanksgiving week 2022 – by New Deal democrat As we start Thanksgiving week, let’s take a look at the current state of COVID. The Alphabet Soup of variants (most of which are direct descendants of BA.5), primarily BQ.1&1.1, has largely displaced their parent, which is down to 24% of all cases: Typically […]
New Deal Democrat’s Weekly Indicators for November 14 – 18 at Seeking Alpha – by New Deal democrat My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. It had to happen sooner or later. Earlier this year, based on the long leading indicators, I went on “Recession Watch.” Now, for the first time in a very […]
Existing home sales decline to recessionary levels; prices have clearly turned down; low inventory still a problem – by New Deal democrat As I wrote earlier this morning, my primary interest in existing home sales at this point is prices. [Note: graphs below for sales and prices does not include October] For the record, existing home […]
Core inflation using house prices rather than imputed rents – by New Deal democrat Later this morning existing home sales will be reported for October, which will mainly be of interest to me only for what happened with prices, and secondarily whether the problem of low inventory which has existed for 3 years is moving in […]
Housing permits and starts continue to fall, but housing under construction continues to (slowly) rise – by New Deal democrat The monthly numbers for housing permits, starts, and single family permits all declined this month. Permits (red in the graph below) declined -38,000 annualized to 1.526 million annualized, and starts (blue) declined -62,000 annualized […]
October retail sales: consumers: “We’re not dead yet!” – by New Deal democrat Retail sales, my favorite consumer indicator, was reported this morning for October. And it was a good number, up +1.3% nominally, and up +0.5% after adjusting for inflation: On the bright side, this was the highest absolute number since April. On the […]
October industrial production: consistent with a very slow expansion – by New Deal democrat I call industrial production the King of Coincident Indicators, because more often than any other metric it coincides with the peaks and troughs of economic activity as determined by the NBER, the official arbiter of recessions. Unlike retail sales, the news […]