US Housing Market Data Response Existing Home Sales (Nov.) The 14% downward revision to the number of existing home sales since 2007 confirms that the housing crash has been deeper than originally thought. But this is old news. Much more important is that the... 21st December 2011 · 1 min read
Canada Data Response Retail Sales (Oct.) October's surprising retail sales, which grew by 1.0%m/m, suggest that household spending began this quarter on a strong footing. For three months in a row now retail volumes have increased strongly... 21st December 2011 · 1 min read
US Chart Pack Inflation set to fall sharply in 2012 We expect the rapid run up in CPI inflation this year to be completely reversed next year, although the core inflation rate will fall more modestly. 21st December 2011 · 1 min read
US Economics Update Monetary Indicators (Nov) The growth rate of all the monetary aggregates has remained steady recently, with our reconstructed measure of the broad M3 aggregate expanding by about 5% over the past year. 20th December 2011 · 1 min read
US Housing Market Data Response Housing Starts (Nov.) Housing starts rose strongly in November, building on the gains seen since the start of the year. By historical standards, homebuilding activity is still very depressed, but at least it appears to be... 20th December 2011 · 1 min read
Canada Data Response Consumer Price Index (Nov.) We expect the official 'core' inflation rate, which was unchanged at 2.1% in November, to stay well within the Bank of Canada's target range of 1% to 3% in the coming months. As the economy slows and... 20th December 2011 · 1 min read
Global Markets Update 2012 should be another disappointing year for US equities The US stock market is ending 2011 with a whimper. The S&P 500 has fallen so far in December, and is fairly close to our year-end target of 1,200. While we do not expect equity prices to collapse next... 20th December 2011 · 1 min read
US Economics Update 2012 will be another year of sluggish growth We expect GDP growth of 1.5% for next year, down trivially from about 1.7% this year. Inflation should fall sharply to below 1% by year end, as commodity prices continue to drop back and the... 19th December 2011 · 1 min read
Canada Economics Weekly Declining household net worth raises red flags For the past decade households have been on a debt-financed consumption and housing investment spree, reinforced recently by historically low interest rates. This trend has been accompanied by rising... 19th December 2011 · 1 min read
US Economics Weekly Is the saving rate higher than it looks? We are not convinced by suggestions that, due to either income being under recorded or based on alternative ways of measuring savings, the true household saving rate is much higher than the published... 19th December 2011 · 1 min read
US Data Response Consumer Prices (Nov.) Consumer prices were unchanged in November, held down by a drop back in gasoline and motor vehicle prices. The annual rate of CPI inflation fell only marginally to a still elevated 3.4%, from 3.5%... 16th December 2011 · 1 min read
US Data Response IP/PPI (Nov), Emp St/Phil Fed (Dec), Cur Ac (Q3) The 0.2% m/m decline in industrial production in November is a bit worse than the 0.1% m/m fall we were expecting, but it looks like the floods in Thailand had more of an impact than we had... 15th December 2011 · 1 min read
Canada Economics Update Global slowdown not the only storm brewing for 2012 As we head into 2012, there still appears to be a sense of misplaced confidence regarding Canada's economic fundamentals and growth prospects. With the US economy set to slow again and the euro zone... 14th December 2011 · 1 min read
Canada Data Response Survey of Manufacturing (Oct.) The drop-back in manufacturing volumes, which fell 0.9% m/m in October, suggest that the risk to our monthly GDP growth assumption of 0.1% now lie to the downside. In addition, the decline raises some... 14th December 2011 · 1 min read
US Economics Update Fed stands pat for now The Fed put off making changes to its communications strategy and potentially announcing a third round of quantitative easing until the new year. 13th December 2011 · 1 min read
US Data Response Retail Sales (Nov.) The disappointing increase in retail sales in November suggests that the start of the holiday shopping season was not half as strong as retailers’ spectacular Black Friday sales reports suggested... 13th December 2011 · 1 min read
