Research >> Economics
DJ-BTMU U.S. Business Barometer rose by a robust 0.9%
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For the week ending July 5 2014, the DJ-BTMU U.S. Business Barometer advanced by a robust 0.9 percent from last week, reaching the highest level of 99.4 since the beginning of the Great Recession. This week’s barometer is driven by both consumption and production indexes. Chain store sales and MBA’s purchase index climbed by 1.6 and 3.7 percent, respectively. As to the production side, auto production jumped 28.4 percent to the highest level since January 4 this year.
On a year-over-year basis, the barometer showed a gain of 1.3 percent, which compares to an average -3.3 percent decline over the Great Recession (ended in June 2009 according to the NBER). After flat lining in 2006, and declining from 2007 through 2009, the barometer bounced back in 2010 to rise by 3.4 percent, which was the strongest increase since 1994 (+4.0 percent), but not so impressive when compared to an -8.0 percent drop in 2009. The rate of increase for the 2013 slowed to 0.7 percent following 1.5 percent in 2012.
The smoothed version of the barometer, which attempts to account for weekly volatility, soared by another modest 0.2 percent. Its year-over-year growth rate remained at 1.0 percent.
Posted: July 17, 2014 Thursday 10:00 AM