Economic Week in Review 28 Mar

• Existing home sales showed significant improvement on a month-to-month basis this week. The report goes on to suggest that the effects of government programs may be seen in the next three to five months potentially adding 1 million resales on the year with a viewpoint that the recovery in housing may be "V" shaped. As Flava Flav from Public Enemy once said, "don't believe the hype"....
• New Home Sales like existing home sales reflected better than expected demand although prices on new homes are not yet improving. Only 12.2 months of supply to go!!
• EIA petroleum report reflected a 2.2 million barrel draw offsetting some of the 3.3 million barrel build in total stocks for the week. The suggestion is that this is evidence that OPEC cuts are in some way limiting supply. However, overall crude inventories remain at three year highs....
• Durable Goods orders rebounded sharply for February. Of course, the December and January numbers were revised sharply lower. Surely, February numbers won't be revised lower in a month....
• GDP was revised marginally lower for Q4- in all, recession continues....
• Jobless Claims reflected a continued deterioration in the labor market to another record level of 5.560 million. Month-to month data reflects another dramatic increase from 392,000 to 495,000 claims (from Feb to Mar)....
• Personal Income reflected a weakening consumer and a rebound in inflation. Wages and salaries declined. Less income and increasing debt reduction tendency (deleveraging) does not bode well for consumer spending. Not good news for an economy which is dependent on consumer spending for 70% of its GDP...
• Consumer Sentiment remained steady at historically low levels....