Economics Update

Well, once again, we have the financial press, trumpeting so called good news, that US home prices did not fall as fast as the previous month, even though the year over year decline was 15.4%.

They are noting that home sales are up a bit, but they neglect to note how many of these sales are short sales and REO (foreclosure, basically) sales.

The numbers that I've seen are around 20-30%, and no one notes that inventory is still at historical highs.

On the brighter side, consumer confidence is up, largely on the fact that Gasoline has fallen over 10% over the past few weeks, as it did again today, though oil is up over concerns regarding hurricane Gustav.

Everyone is expecting a fully coupled worldwide slowdown, and so the Dollar is now at a 6 month high, even though we are seeing signs of commodities bouncing back, at least that's what the market in copper is showing, with contracts for immediate delivery being rather higher than those for 3 months delivery.

I would also note that Fannie and Freddie are slowing the rate of mortgage purchases for their portfolio, which means two things, that mortgages will be harder to get and more expensive, and that they are "deleveraging", which is finance speak for trying to get themselves out of the hole that they have dug.