United States
U.S. Tuesday Data Highlights
October 18, 2011
A greater-than-assumed 2.3% leap in producer energy prices spearheaded last month’s 0.8% rise of the overall PPI index and lifted on-year energy price inflation to 18.4% from 15.9% in the year to August. Core producer price inflation is in the Goldilocks zone. A monthly gain of 0.2% after 0.1% in August isn’t excessive, but by […] More
Service Sector Activity Accelerated in the U.S. but Slowed in Euroland Last Month
June 3, 2011
U.S. service sector activity partly recovered in May according to the purchasing manager survey after a sharp slowdown in April. In Euroland, however, there was a slower pace of positive growth in May with only marginally rising activity in Ireland, Spain and Italy. The U.S. minus Euroland PMI spread for services therefore narrowed by 2.5 […] More
PMI Data Show Big Swing in Europe’s Favor
May 4, 2011
In January of this year, the United States purchasing manager survey indices in both manufacturing and services exceeded their Euroland counterparts by 3.5 points each. Just three months later, it is Euroland’s service sector that enjoys a 3.5-point advantage over the United States, and the spread in manufacturing has narrowed by 1.1 points to +2.4 […] More
Purchasing Managers Surveys: Smaller U.S. Advantage Against Euroland
March 3, 2011
The United States and Euroland experienced fairly decent activity in both service sector activity and manufacturing last month according to purchasing manager survey data released this week. In a scale where a score of 50.0 delineates neutrality between expansion and contraction and readings of 60 connote a truly brisk pace, none of the four overall […] More
Today’s North American Data
February 22, 2011
U.S. consumer confidence according to the Conference Board survey advanced 5.6 points to 70.4 in February and by 17.1 points over the first two months of this year. More confidence is being expressed about the labor market even though employment increased merely 36K in January and at a 56K per month rate over the past […] More
Today’s U.S. and Canadian Data
November 10, 2010
Four indicators of interest were released at 13:30 GMT today: U.S. and Canadian trade figures for September, U.S. jobless insurance claims and U.S. import and export prices. The downward trend in new U.S. jobless insurance claims, a proxy for the layoff rate, has resumed after a roughly 11-month pause dating back to the autumn of […] More
October PMI Results Favor United States Over Euro Zone
November 4, 2010
Purchasing managers survey results were more U.S.-advantageous in October than September and in September than August. The sum of the U.S. minus Euroland manufacturing and services spreads, shown in the right-most column of the table below, was +3.3 in October after minus 0.2 in September and minus 3.2 points in August. Much of this change […] More
U.S. and Canadian Labor Markets Lost Momentum Last Quarter
October 8, 2010
U.S. non-farm payroll jobs slumped 218K in the third quarter following a 570K advance in the second quarter. Canada’s labor market, where employment had shot up 226.6K in the second quarter, added only 19.9K positions in 3Q. In September alone, both economies lost jobs, Canada for the second time in three months and the United […] More
Shifting Geographical Sources of Global Growth
October 7, 2010
The IMF’s October 2010 World Economic Outlook released in conjunction with this week’s IMF/World Bank meetings in Washington contains useful information for sorting world growth trends over the past two decades. Growth rates in the table below are expressed in annualized terms, that is percent per annum. Figures in the right-most column embody IMF growth […] More
North American GDP and Unemployment
September 30, 2010
Canada and the United States released subdued GDP figures today. Canadian July GDP slipped 0.1%. Although negative growth in July had been expected, this was the first decline in eleven months, and weakness was pervasive. Manufacturing and construction respectively contracted by 0.7% and 0.5%. Energy, utilities, retail and wholesale turnover fell by 0.6%, 0.4%, 0.5% […] More
