Update Economic USA Housing
Housing starts declined for the month by 2.6% to a 1.172 million units annual rate. While permits also slowed by 2.5% to 1.299 million unit annual rate. This may initially look to be a troubling market, but when examined on a longer term basis we see a different picture. On an annual basis starts are up 0.7% while permits are up 5.7%.
Update Economic USA Industrial Production
Industrial production continues to grow with a 1 percent increase over last month. Capacity utilization was up 0.6 percentage points to 76.7%. This economic measurement is gradually approaching the long-term average of 79.9%.
USA Stock Consideration Update
AWK, One Gas,PG&E, TER, VAC all move to Sell, CMP, CGI, RRD, VSAT move to Buy
Update Economic USA CPI
With retail sales advancing for the year we would expect to see an increase in CPI over the next few months. At the moment, overall prices to the consumer are remaining tame, but have advanced by 2.2% which is higher than the Fed Reserve target level of 2.0%.
Update USA Retail Sales
Retail sales increased for the month and year-over-year. Sales increased by 0.4% for the month of April and 4.5% since this time last year. Online sales are increasing at a rapid rate of 10.7% from last year while department store sales fell 5.2% over the same period of time. If retails sales continue to increase at this rate it will be considered inflationary. This would make the Federal Reserve very happy.