Tag Archives: House Prices

New home sales were reported for July as down nearly 13% to 511K, a number that is just about the average since 2010 (543k). But that doesn’t tell the whole story obviously. New home sales have fallen sharply since December of last year, down 39%. The drop from the peak in August 2020 is even more dramatic, down nearly 51%. Obviously, the fall this year is related to rising mortgage rates but that can’t be the reason sales have been falling for nearly two years....

There’s an old saying on Wall Street that one should “buy the rumor, sell the news”, a pithy way to express the efficient market theorem. By the time an event arrives, whatever it may be, the market will have fully digested the news and incorporated it into current prices. And then the market will move on to anticipating the next event, large or small. What prompts this review of Wall Street folk wisdom is the most recent employment report. The BLS reported Friday,...

This economic cycle is one of the longest on record for the US, eight years and counting since the end of the last recession. It has also been, as almost everyone knows, a fairly weak expansion, one that has managed to disappoint both bull and bear. Growth has oscillated around a 2% rate for most of the expansion, falling at times perilously close to recession while at others rising tantalizingly close to escape...