Research >> Economics
BTMU U.S. Business Barometer declined by 0.3%
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For the week ending September 26 2015, the BTMU U.S. Business Barometer declined by 0.3 percent to 98.0. This week’s barometer was driven by both consumption and production indexes. MBA’s purchase index fell by 5.6 percent, following a significant gain of 9.1 percent in the prior week. Chain store sales also dropped by 0.3 percent. As to the production side, auto and truck production decreased by 7.4 and 0.8 percent, respectively. Although lumber and steel production posted positive performances, they were not enough to offset the losses in other productions indexes.
On a year-over-year basis, the barometer showed a loss of 0.2 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, declined by 0.2 percent to 98.3. Its year-over-year growth rate was 0.0 percent.
Posted: October 8, 2015 Thursday 10:00 AM