As long as initial claims remain on a comfortable 320,000 glide-path into the new year, we should see continued payroll growth of 180,000 to 190,000. |
Confidence should remain healthy well into 2006 given robust trends for employment, income, and consumer spending. |
Fed tightening is being transmitted throughout the yield curve to other rates, so we're really just starting to see the result of a year and a half of Fed tightening. |
For existing home sales, we may have passed the peak in 2005. The story line for 2006 is going to be a slowdown, primarily in those geographic areas that have seen big gains. |
Higher energy prices could sap some strength from real growth, but sentiment is likely to bounce once Katrina disruptions abate. |
Our guess is that the Fed is going to attempt to avoid any such signal in the minutes, but it's possible the market will attempt to find one anyway. |
Overall, trade deficits tend to widen with hurricanes, due to the Southeast region's bias towards exports to Latin America over imports. |
The confidence numbers are perhaps the most unexpected and perhaps added a little worry to the broader mix |
The current level of initial claims data is consistent with a historically low unemployment rate. |
The momentum in the economy and job market, combined with mortgage rates that remain near generational lows, continues to provide a solid backdrop for housing, |
The September employment figures could be interpreted as signaling a slowdown in the economy with a pickup in wage growth, but don't count on it, ... The impact of hurricane Floyd might well have been larger than indicated. |
The September employment figures could be interpreted as signaling a slowdown in the economy with a pickup in wage growth, but don't count on it. The impact of hurricane Floyd might well have been larger than indicated. |
This more pure measure has a nearly perfect prediction pattern dating back to 1966, with leads of 9-20 months. |
We had felt auto sales would be the wart, the one thing pulling consumer spending down in the month, but these sales were solid. Depending on what we get for employment Friday it looks like January economic activity will turn out to be quite solid. |
We have higher highs for the deficit as we go into the middle of 2006. We have the [monthly trade] numbers getting into the low $70 billion range by the third quarter. |