Economic Radar: GDP, Jobs, M2, Rail, Gas, SAAR

Updated on

This post first appeared on FloatingPath

Economic Radar: GDP, Jobs, M2, Rail, Gas, SAAR

Recap of this week’s U.S. economic events:

  1. Real GDP increased at a SAAR of 2.84% in the advance reading for Q3.
  2. The U.S. Employment Situation.
  3. Disposable personal income increased 0.4% in September.
  4. Consumer credit outstanding increased at a SAAR of 5.4% in September.
  5. Factory orders increased 1.7% in September.
  6. The ISM non-manufacturing NMI expanded to 55.4 in October.
  7. The national gas price was $3.34 per gallon in October.
  8. Sales of lightweight vehicles increased slightly to a SAAR of 15.23 million in October.
  9. Consumer sentiment sunk to its lowest reading since December 2011.
  10. Now Tracking: Restaurant Performance Index.
  11. Now Tracking: Rail Traffic.
  12. Initial jobless claims decreased to 336k.
  13. The National Financial Conditions Index was unchanged at -0.87.
  14. Store sales are a bit soft heading into the winter season.
  15. M2 decreased 0.07% week over week.

Further U.S. economy reading this week:

This week is the first of the new U.S. Economic Radar. I have changed the format to a PDF which will have better resolution and allow readers to see more at once.

Economic indicators have been separated into their Absolute Strength and the Direction they are moving in. The data points are colored by how many standard deviations they are better than or worse than their historical average, with bright green being good and bright red being bad.

For example, you can see that housing indicators are currently very weak on a historical basis, but that they are improving rapidly.

This color-scaling also helps to spot outliers in certain areas of the economy. Most Stability measurements are more or less decent, but the SNAP participation as a share of employed ratio is near historical highs.

I will be further building on this template going forward, and tinkering with things where necessary to best convey a true sense of the nation’s economic status.

Included at the bottom is an economic schedule for the week ahead, along with what the trend has been for each of those indicators. Click below for PDF.

Leave a Comment