Fundamentals 6/23: More Jobs Trouble

Initial Jobless Claims
– 429,000 for week ended June 18, up 9,000 from previous week
– 4-week moving average 426,250, unchanged from previous week
– Claims have been above 400,000 for the past 11 weeks
– Job market remains extremely weak.

Home Sales
– May New Home Sales: 319,000 (annualized)
– Down 2.1% since April, up 13.5% since May 2010
– Months of supply at 6.2 months, lowest reading since April 2010
– Median new-house price $222,600, down 3.4% since May 2010

This data along with Bernanke’s press conference yesterday is hammering equities and resulting in Treasury buying meaning higher mortgage and Treasury prices and lower rates. The growing consensus is that both Keynesian deficit spending and aggressive Fed monetary policy have done almost nothing to get solid gains to either GDP or the jobs market. Worse, the consumer has no confidence that the the situation will get better any time soon. This doesn’t encourage things such as home buying.