UPDATE: Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen testifies before the Joint Economic Committee (10am, Thursday)

 

LAST WEEK

News & Commentary Weekly Highlights:

• Market Watch: Data May Support Fed View that Economy ‘Good Enough’ for Rate Hike (Monday)
• Wall Street Journal: A Smaller Share of High-School Grads Are Heading to College—Especially Poorer Ones (Wednesday)
• Market Watch: Rising Rates Could Put Brakes on Car Sales: New York Fed (Monday)
• Wall Street Journal: More Young Adults Live With Their Parents Now Than During the Recession (Monday)
• Project Syndicate: A Hard Look at a Soft Global Economy (Monday)

 

Top Economic Indicator Highlights:

Gross Domestic Product (second estimate, Q3)

• Real GDP Quarterly Change (annual rate): 2.1%, Previous quarter: 3.9%, Recovery avg.: 2.2%
• Average of GDP and GDI (Gross Domestic Income): 2.6%, Real GDI grew 3.1%
• Noteworthy: Positive contributions to third quarter GDP included an upward revision in private inventory investment, which shows a smaller decline than previously expected. However, this upward revision was partially offset by downward revisions in personal consumption expenditures and exports. The increase in real GDP reflects positive contributions from personal consumption expenditures, residential and nonresidential fixed investment, state and local government spending, and exports. The third and final estimate of GDP for the second quarter will be released on December 22^nd.
• Current Forecasts for Q3 2015: Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow forecasts fourth quarter annualized real GDP growth of 1.8%. Wells Fargo’s current forecast is 2.2%. Wall Street Journal’s survey of economists predicts an increase of 2.7%.

 

THIS WEEK

Upcoming Economic Reports & Releases:

Major Indicators

• Pending Home Sales Index (10am, Monday)
• Motor Vehicle Sales (Tuesday)
• Institute for Supply Management Manufacturing Index (10am, Tuesday)
• Construction Spending (10am, Tuesday)
• Productivity & Costs (8:30am, Wednesday)
• Factory Orders (10am, Thursday)
• Institute for Supply Management Non-Manufacturing Index (10am, Thursday)
• International Trade (8:30am, Friday)
• Employment Situation (8:30am, Friday)

 

Reports

• Beige Book (2pm, Wednesday)

 

Chart of the Week: 

The chart above shows the percentage point difference between the long-run inflation target of 2 percent that the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) has deemed “most consistent over the longer run with the Federal Reserve's statutory mandate” of price stability, as compared with the 12-month change in the headline Personal Consumption Expenditure (PCE) price index and the headline Consumer Price Index (CPI). As the chart demonstrates, the distance between the 2 percent target and each measure shows a difference of nearly 2 percentage points in October. See this St. Louis Fed article for more information.