Another Solid MBA Mortgage Applications Report In the week of September 20th, the MBA mortgage applications composite index fell 10.1% weekly after falling 0.1%. That looks pretty bad compared to the recent housing data, but keep in mind yearly growth is still solid and because the MBA data is more
Stability Ends For Stocks As Politics Causes Modest Volatility On Tuesday, the S P 500 fell the most in 1 month. Mostly because House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced an impeachment inquiry. It caused stocks to fall probably because of the uncertainty of the situation. Democrats control the House and
Conference Board Confidence Wanes University of Michigan consumer confidence index and the Conference Board index showed vast differences in August. Especially since the former was much more pessimistic than the latter. These two have converged in September as the preliminary University of Michigan
Markets Take A Breather Unusual action in markets is that nothing is happening. S P 500 - SPX has closed within 2% of 3,000 for 12 straight sessions. It makes sense for markets to pause because they are heading into a news laden month. In October, there is another Fed meeting, Q3 earnings season, th
Positive National Chicago Fed Reading Bears love to pick out the negative readings in the national Chicago Fed index and use them as evidence for a recession forecast. Anyone who has followed this report for a few months knows that’s not the correct way to look at it. Firstly, negative readings are
Trade News Sends Stocks Lower S P 500 was up slightly Friday morning as it was very close to its record high. Then negative trade news came out which sent stocks down modestly. S P 500 closed the day down 0.49%. I think these trade dealings work in trends. When you start to hear grumblings of negoti
Slight Decline In Philly Fed Index Philly Fed manufacturing index fell slightly just like the Empire Fed index. It went from 16.8 to 12 which beat estimates by 1 point. As you can see from the chart below, the Philly Fed index and the average of the 5 key indexes are way above the ISM
Stocks Mostly Flat On Thursday S P 500 opened up, increased in the morning, and fell throughout the afternoon on Thursday. It closed the day almost exactly where it started. We need to wait another day for the S P 500 to hit a new record high. It will likely happen soon. Stocks haven’t reacted much
No 2019 Recession Because Of Housing Earlier this summer, many investors predicted real residential investment growth would finally get out of the doghouse it has been in for 6 quarters. And that it would also have a positive impact on Q3 GDP growth. Based on early indications from the Atlanta Fed G
Wild Action After Fed Statement: Stocks End Flat S P 500 was down slightly before the Fed meeting. There wasn’t much of a reaction to the statement. Then Powell spoke which created volatility. S P 500 bottomed at 2,981. Then it spiked in the last hour trading. It increased 0.85% to close the day up
