Economic Reports 02/28/09

S&P Case Schiller Home Price Index Dec 162.2 vs 166.1

House-price contraction is at the center of the great financial meltdown that, despite all the efforts so far, is still underway.

Case-Shiller shows that contraction is steady and severe, at -2.3% for the Composite-10 index and at -2.5% for the Composite-20.

Year-on-year declines are accelerating, at -19.2% for the 10 index and at -18.5% for the 20 index.

Existing Home Sales Jan -5.3%

A disappointing existing home sales report shows supply on the market remains extreme, at 3.6 million units for 9.6 months of supply vs. 9.4 months in December.

Home price contraction remains the single greatest threat to the economy. The median price fell 3.1% in January to $170,300 for a 14.8% year-on-year decline.

New Home SalesJan -10.2% at 309K

A very steep 10.2% decline to a record low as home-price contraction, which has upended the financial system, is continuing uninterrupted.

The median price for a new home fell a very steep 9.9% in January to $201,100, pulling down the year-on-year rate to -13.5%.

Inventory at 13.3 months, a record and well up from 12.2 months in December.

Falling home prices and lower mortgage rates have yet to reverse housing's long and deepening slide.

Durable Goods Orders Jan -5.2% vs -4.6%

Durable goods orders in January fell for a record six consecutive months – though the series only starts in 1992.

Excluding transportation, new orders declined 2.5%. Weakness was broad-based but led by a drop in defense orders. Excluding defense, the latest month was down 2.3%.

Year-on-year, overall new orders for durable goods weakened further to down 23.3% in January from down 22.9% in December.

By industry group, the largest decline was in transportation which dropped a monthly 13.5%.

Within this group, defense aircraft orders were down 28.3% and motor vehicles fell 6.4%.

Chicago NAPM Feb 34.2 vs 33.3

The 4th straight month of contraction was severe but not accelerating in the Chicago purchasers' report...

t is except for employment where the pace of job losses is increasing.

Employment was down to 25.2 vs. 34.8 in January and 39.2 in December. The reading points to yet further contraction for factory payrolls.

Initial Claims +36K at 667K

All signals point to one of the very worst reports ever for next week's monthly jobs data.

Initial claims for the Feb. 21 at the highest level in 26 years. Continuing claims are the worst ever, up 114K to 5.112 million

Q4 GDP -6.2% vs est. -3.8% vs Q3 -0.5%

Bad enough real GDP contraction is now over negative -6%; the GDP price index was revised up to plus 0.5%. Yoy growth for the GDP price index is +2%

Comments