Historically Low Jobless Claims & Strong GDP Results Amid Lower-Than-Expected 4Q17 Corporate Profits4/5/2018
Generally positive economic news, including record low jobless claims, overshadowed weakness in corporate profits in last week’s economic news, and markets became nerved over potential backlash from China regarding a potential trade war.
Economic highlights from last week included:
Last week’s economic news was slightly disappointing, as a number of indicators missed estimates, though jobless claims fell to a 45-year low. Still, given the higher than usual number of states estimating claims, the jobless claims number is a rough estimate.
According to the National Association of Realtors (NAR), sales of existing homes increased 5.6%, the strongest pace in over a decade, in November.
The Commerce Department announced today that November new housing starts resulted in a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.3 million units, with single-family houses being the biggest driver with an 8.7% increase so far this year. This is the fastest pace of single-family housing starts since September 2007, right before the start of the Great Recession.
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