Economic Indicators, Stock Market & Investment Reports
The abrupt decline in the dollar, by about 10 percent since early June against major currencies, is upsetting the delicate balance of world economies still recovering from the shocks of the financial crisis.
Many other currencies, especially in Asia and in emerging markets like Brazil, are soaring as a result of the dollar’s fall. Those nations’ domestic economies are attracting floods of speculative capital seeking higher interest rates and are at risk of overheating.
The dollar’s decline is being driven by what everyone in global markets is now expecting: another round of so-called quantitative easing by the United States. In the next few weeks, the Federal Reserve is expected to inject vast sums of money into the economy in another attempt to spur growth.
While such policies may benefit the convalescent United States economy, they are also drawing criticism that Washington is deliberately devaluing the dollar at others’ expense.
Source: The New York Times
The recession officially ended in June 2009, according to the Business Cycle Dating Committee of the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), a group charged with determining when recessions officially begin and end.
This official end date makes the most recent downturn the longest since World War II. This recent recession, having begun in December 2007, lasted 18 months. Until now the longest postwar recessions were those of 1973-5 and 1981-2, which each lasted 16 months. Read full article at SmartInMoney.com
Major economic indicators that are widely followed by investors include gross domestic product (GDP), consumer price index (CPI), and unemployment rate, according SmartInMoney.com.
Gross Domestic Product: Gauging the economic health
Gross domestic product, commonly referred to as GDP, is commonly used as an indicator of the economic health of a country, as well as to gauge a country's standard of living. GDP measures the overall value of the goods and services produced by the U.S. economy in a specific time period; and is often thought of as the most important economic indicator. GDP is made up of several factors, including public consumption or consumer spending; business investment; federal, state, and local government spending; and net exports (exports less imports).
U.S. consumer sentiment was the most optimistic in more than two years in June, but remained far below average level, according to a survey released Friday by Reuters and the University of Michigan. The UMich index rose to 76.0 in late June, up from 73.6 in May and 75.5 in mid-June. The average level of the index is around 87. Consumers expect a very slow pace of economic growth, the survey said.
The U.S. economy continued to grow in the first quarter. National output expanded at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.2 percent last quarter, after growing 5.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 2009. This marked the third quarter in a row the economy showed strong economic growth. Economists are optimistic that the news may breed more confidence about the future turnaround.
Increased consumer spending played a significant role in the last quarter expansion. Consumer spending grew at 3.6 percent annual rate in the first part of the year, after growing at 1.6 percent annual rate in the previous three months.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filed a case to sue Goldman Sachs and one of its employees for civil fraud, alleging they defrauded investors in selling a financial product tied to subprime mortgages, in 2007.
The SEC's allegation focuses on a mortgage securities transaction structured by Goldman, for which it allegedly earned $15 million in fees. Goldman allegedly helped hedge fund Paulson & Co., led by John Paulson, bet against those securities, and Paulson's firm made a profit of about $1 billion. Investors in the mortgage securities lost more than $1 billion, the SEC said.
The instrument in the S.E.C. case, called Abacus 2007-AC1, was one of 25 deals that Goldman created so the bank and select clients could bet against the housing market.
Payrolls surge in March marked the beginning of job recovery as employers added 162,000 nonfarm jobs. This good news came from the Labor Department reported on Friday, after eight million jobs lost since the beginning of recession in December 2007. To absorb only new entrants into the labor market the economy needs to add more than 100,000 jobs a month.While the unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent, economists saw signs in the latest report that the economy was poised to make steady progress.
The abrupt decline in the dollar, by about 10 percent since early June against major currencies, is upsetting the delicate balance of world economies still recovering from the shocks of the financial crisis.
