Succinct Summation of the Week's Events

Succinct Summation of the Week's Events:

Positives,

1)Initial claims remained low at 207k, 8k under the estimate and down from 212k last week. Continuing claims, delayed by a week, fell back under 1.8mm at 1.781mm.

2)Pending home sales in March rose by 3.4% m/o/m, above the forecast of up .4%. Three out of the 4 national regions saw a rise. The NAR said the index level of 78.2 is the highest since February 2023 but “still remains in a fairly narrow range over the last 12 months without a measurable breakout. Meaningful gains will only occur with declining mortgage rates and rising inventory.”

3)New home sales in March totaled 693k, 25k more than expected but February was revised down by the exact same amount to 637k. While the absolute number of homes again rose, the higher sales in the month saw a drop in months’ supply to 8.3 from 8.8. and vs 8.2 in the month before that. Thanks to mix, the median home price fell 1.9% y/o/y, though was up 6% sequentially.

4)The Eurozone April services PMI rose to 52.9 from 51.5 with the French seeing its services PMI back above 50 at 50.5 while Germany's improved to 53.3 from 50.1. Both were better than expected.

5)The UK April services PMI improved to 54.9 from 53.1. 

6)Japan's service sector also led the way in April as this component of its PMI rose to 54.6 from 54.1 while manufacturing about flat lined at 49.9, though up 1.7 pts m/o/m.

7)Australia's PMI saw services at 54.2 and manufacturing at 49.9, following the trend seen elsewhere as stated. 

8)India remains the outlier where manufacturing is doing almost as well as its service sector. Services rose .5 pt to 61.7 and manufacturing held well above 50 at 59.1 and we know the latter is benefiting from supply chain diversification. 

9)From Royal Caribbean: "Wow, what a great start to the year! Demand for our leading brands and the incredible experiences they deliver continues to be very robust.

10)From Hilton: "Leisure transient RevPAR exceeded our expectations even with tough y/o/y comparisons, given continued strength in international markets and holiday shifts. Business transient recovery remained steady with RevPAR across large corporates up more than 3%, driven by strong demand in consulting and government contracting."