Economics Update

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In terms of economic indicators, we have 4 today, one up, and three down.

• Jobless claims rose by 17,000, to 372,000.
• The Philadelphia Manufacturing index, which measures manufacturing activity, fell to minus 24.9, lower than was forecast.
• New home construction fell to a 17-year low.
• Conference Board's index of leading U.S. economic indicators rose for the first time in 5 months, +0.15
  

FWIW, the Jobless claims are noisy, but overall the numbers are trending up, and the LEI typically does not mean anything until you get three in a row.

The Dollar hit a new low vs. the Euro, $1.5982:€.

As an aside, I spend a fair amount of time on currency, because I believe that it will be the final nail in the proverbial coffin, much like it was in the Asian and Argentine financial crises.

In banking, investment and otherwise, we have
Merrilly Lynch announcing a $6.5 billion write down and massive layoffs.

Across the pond, we have the Bank of England announcing that it had three times as many bids for its cash auction as it was offering, implying that credit is still pretty frozen, and the prospect of massive bank failures in Germany as a result of the subprime crisis, which truth be told extends well into the prime mortgages too.

Finally, in another sign of the apocalypse, my predictions regarding the countrywide sale, that Bank of America was throwing good money after bad, appear to be coming true, as , "Continued credit deterioration at Countrywide Financial Corp. could raise concern among investors about the final sale price of the mortgage lender to Bank of America Corp., a Lehman Brothers analyst said Thursday."