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• Global Business Confidence
• Global business sentiment softened last week and remains fragile, but it is well off its late April bottom. Last week's pull-back was evident across the globe and all survey questions. As has been the case for the past year, the most pessimistic responses are to the broad-based questions regarding present conditions and the six-month outlook. There has been a worrisome increase in pricing pressures during the past month. Confidence remains weakest in the U.S. where it suggests the economy is still contracting, and it is strongest in Asia where it is consistent with an economy growing near its potential.

• Conference Board Consumer Confidence
• The Conference Board index of consumer confidence fell further in June to 50.4 from May's 58.1 (revised from 57.2). This puts the index at a 16-year low, and this is the fourth-lowest reading in the history of the survey, which dates back to 1969. The present situation component of the index led the decline, but expectations fell significantly as well. Assessments of labor market conditions fell severely.

• Jobless Claims
• Initial jobless claims were unchanged in the week ending June 21, remaining at 384,000. This is on the high end of what has been seen thus far this downturn, and suggestive that the labor market is still fragile. Nevertheless, it appears that layoffs are no longer accelerating but have reached their peak trend.

• GDP
• GDP growth in the first quarter was revised upward to 1% annualized in the final report, from 0.9% in the preliminary report. The 1% growth is equal to the consensus estimate. There were upward revisions to exports, consumer spending and business investment, which were largely offset by an upward revision to imports and a downward revision to inventory investment. Profits saw a downward revision, to $1.56 trillion annualized, a decline of $5.2 billion from the fourth quarter; this is the third straight quarterly decline in profits. This compares with an estimated increase in profits of $5.2 billion in the preliminary report. The U.S. economy continues to expand weakly.

• Durable Goods (Advance)
• New orders for manufactured durable goods rose slightly in May by 0.03%; consensus forecasts were expecting a small decline. This was the first increase in new orders since February and came on the heels of a 1% decline in April. Orders excluding transportation fell 0.9% as civilian and defense aircraft boosted the top-line number. Core capital goods orders fell 0.8%, but shipments were up 0.6%. Another large drop in overall shipments indicates that manufacturing conditions are little improved since the start of the year, though they are holding up better than during prior recessions.

• OFHEO Purchase-Only House Price Index
• U.S. house prices fell by 0.8% from March to April 2008, according to OFHEO's monthly purchase-only price index. Although this is a lower rate of depreciation than in December to January when prices fell by a full 1%, it is still higher than the previous two months and indicates an accelerating rate of depreciation, along with continuing worsening of demand conditions in housing markets. As usual, the rate of price depreciation was uneven between regions, with the Pacific region recording the largest decline while the East and West South Central divisions recorded price increases.

• Monthly Home Price Index - Further Slowing!
• House price declines slowed further in April. Both the 10-city and 20-city composite S&P/Case-Shiller house price indices declined again in April, by lesser amounts on a month-ago basis. The 10-city composite fell 1.6% and the 20-city dropped 1.4%. However, prices were down on a year-ago basis by record amounts again. The 10-city composite was down 16.4% over the past year, and the 20-city composite was down 15.3% over the past year. Prices fell in 12 of the 20 metro areas in April from a month ago.

• New-Home Sales (C25)
• Home sales declined in May as housing markets continue on a downward trend. Sales of new single- family homes for May came in at 512,000 after seasonal adjustment, a decrease of 2.5% below the revised April total of 525,000 sales, and 40.3% below the total for May 2007 of 857,000. The supply of new single-family homes remains high at 10.9 months, given the current rate of sales. The new sales totals correlate well with both falling home prices and fewer purchase mortgage loan applications.

• Existing-Home Sales
• Housing improved, with the National Association of Realtors reporting a 2% increase in existing-home sales in May to an annualized pace of 5 million. The months of inventory available for sale hit 10.8. The median existing-home price was down 6.3% y/y. Discounted home prices are helping to spur buyers back into the market.

• MBA Mortgage Applications Survey
• The MBA market composite indices finished lower for the week ending June 20, despite a decrease in contract rates. The market index fell by 9.3% compared with the week before. Refinancing applications continued falling, with the refinance index finishing down by 12.1% from the previous week. Purchase applications were down by 7.4%. Apparently, falling interest rates were either insufficient or too late this week to jump-start any sort of market rally, so the indices continued their downward trend.

• Chain Store Sales
• Chain store sales fell 0.6% in the week ending June 21, following two weeks of gains according to the ICSC. Year-over-year growth inched up to 2.2%, the strongest in seven weeks. Sales were reportedly hurt by cooler weather, but benefited from stabilization in gasoline prices and continued distribution of tax rebate checks.

• Natural Gas Storage Report
• Working gas in underground storage rose by 90 billion cubic feet during the week ending June 20, in line with consensus expectations. Working gas in underground storage was 2,033 bcf as of June 20, 382 bcf lower than a year ago and 56 bcf below the five-year average for this time of year.

• Oil and Gas Inventories
• Crude oil inventories rose by 0.8 million barrels for the week ending June 20, according to the Energy Information Administration, contradicting expectations of a 1.4 million barrel decline. Gasoline inventories fell by 0.1 million barrels, in line with expectations. Distillate supplies rose by 2.8 million barrels, higher than the expected 1.9 million barrel build. Refinery operating capacity fell to 88.6% from 89.3%. This report points downward for prices.

Source: Economy.com 2008