This week we had a couple of market-moving numbers, but ended flat. When you watch the bond market like we do, it gets exciting and can foreshadow things to come, such as higher rates.
Tuesday we had the July retail sales number coming in much stronger than expected at 0.6% – yeah summer spenders – helping the economy, but putting an inflationary scare into the bond market.
Wednesday, July housing starts were down 4.8% and building permits were down 4.1%, which was mortgage interest rate neutral.
Thursday was a number that I don’t usually share with you but it was so unusual I had to. The WEEKLY jobless claims were down 12,000 which is a pretty big number for 1 week bringing the jobless down to 232,000. Good for the people who got the jobs (or did they just give up?). But bad news for the mortgage interest rates. Is this foretelling of what we will see the First Friday of the month monthly jobs reports? If so we may be seeing the next rise in mortgage rates.
More people working means more sales, higher prices, and away we go.