This weekly email has three parts: the Schedule of economic data for the following week, a Review of data for the previous week, and a brief Commentary on a current topic.
The key reports this coming week are the 3rd estimate of Q1 GDP, May New Home Sales and May Personal Income & Outlays with PCE inflation.
----- Monday, June 22nd -----
No major economic releases scheduled.
----- Tuesday, June 23rd -----
10:00 AM: Richmond Fed Survey of Manufacturing Activity for June. The consensus is for a decrease to 9 from 13 in May.
----- Wednesday, Wednesday, June 24th -----
7:00 AM: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.
10:00 AM: New Home Sales for May from the Census Bureau. This graph shows New Home Sales since 1963. The dashed line is the sales rate for last month. The consensus is for 640 thousand SAAR in May, up from 622 thousand in April.
10:00 AM: State Employment and Unemployment (Monthly) for May 2025.
During the day: The AIA's Architecture Billings Index for May (a leading indicator for commercial real estate).
----- Thursday, June 25th -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released. The consensus is for initial claims to decreased to 225 thousand from 226 thousand last week.
8:30 AM: Chicago Fed National Activity Index for May. This is a composite index of other data.
8:30 AM: Gross Domestic Product, 1st Quarter 2026 (Third Estimate), Industries, Corporate Profits, State GDP, and State Personal Income. The consensus is that real GDP increased 1.6% annualized in Q1, unchanged from 1.6% in the second estimate.
8:30 AM: Personal Income and Outlays, May 2026. The consensus is for a 0.4% increase in personal income, and for a 0.6% increase in personal spending. And for the Core PCE price index to increase 0.3%.
8:30 AM: Durable Goods Orders for May. The consensus is for a 0.5% increase in durable goods.
11:00 AM: Kansas City Fed Survey of Manufacturing Activity for June.
----- Friday, June 26th -----
10:00 AM: University of Michigan's Consumer sentiment index (Final for June). The consensus is for a reading of 49.3.
• Housing Starts Decreased Sharply to 1.177 million Annual Rate in May
• 2nd Look at Local Housing Markets in May
• Part 2: Current State of the Housing Market; Overview for mid-June 2026
Data was mixed last week, but mostly weaker than expected.
• Oil and Gas prices. WTI oil prices are at $78 per barrel as of this writing, down from the war peak, but up 20% from late February. The national average gasoline price is $3.93 per gallon, down from the recent peak of $4.56 per gallon, but up about 33% since late February.
• New York Fed Empire State manufacturing survey for May.
The headline general business conditions index remained positive but fell fourteen points to 5.7.
This was below the consensus estimate.
• Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization for May.
Industrial production (IP) edged up 0.1 percent in May after rising 0.9 percent in April. Manufacturing output was unchanged in May after increasing 0.7 percent in April. In May, the index for mining rose 1.3 percent, and the index for utilities decreased 0.4 percent. At 102.6 percent of its 2017 average, total IP in May was 1.7 percent above its year-earlier level. Capacity utilization edged up to 76.2 percent, a rate that is 3.2 percentage points below its long-run (1972–2025) average.
This was slightly below the consensus estimate.
• June NAHB homebuilder survey.
Builder confidence in the market for newly built single-family homes fell two points to 35 in June, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB)/Wells Fargo Housing Market Index (HMI) released today. This is the 14th straight month that sentiment has remained below 40, a streak not seen since 2011-2012 during the foreclosure crisis.
This was below the consensus estimate.
• The mortgage purchase applications index from the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA).
The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 3 percent from one week earlier. The unadjusted Purchase Index decreased 5 percent compared with the previous week and was 3 percent higher than the same week one year ago.
This remains historically weak.
Advance estimates of U.S. retail and food services sales for May 2026, adjusted for seasonal variation and holiday and trading-day differences, but not for price changes, were $763.7 billion, up 0.9 percent from the previous month, and up 6.9 percent from May 2025.
This was well above the consensus estimate as retail sales were boosted by gasoline prices.
• Pending Home Sales Index for May.
Pending home sales in May increased by 3.8% month-over-month and 4.8% year-over-year, according to the National Association of REALTORS® Pending Home Sales report.
This was well above the consensus estimate.
• FOMC Announcement and Projections.
As expected there was no change to policy. The Fed Funds rate was kept at at 3-1/2 to 3-3/4 percent. The projections were '“hawkish” suggesting a possible rate hike later this year.
• The initial weekly unemployment claims report.
In the week ending June 13, the advance figure for seasonally adjusted initial claims was 226,000, a decrease of 4,000 from the previous week’s revised level.
This was weaker than expected.
• Philly Fed manufacturing survey for June.
The diffusion index for current general activity rose from -0.4 in May to 10.3 in June
This was slightly weaker than expected.
As expected, there was no change to the Fed Funds rate at the FOMC meeting this week. A few key points:
This was Fed Chairman’s Kevin Warsh first meeting and he announced the creation of five task forces to review 1) Fed communications, 2) the Fed’s balance sheet, 3) the Fed’s data sources, 4) “productivity and jobs” and 5) the Fed’s inflation framework.
The projections were “hawkish” with 9 members of the FOMC projecting a rate hike later this year (Warsh didn’t submit projections).
Market expectations have moved from two rate cuts this year to a rate hike in September with a possible second hike in December.
As far as the projections, GDP was revised up slightly and the unemployment rate was mostly unchanged. However inflation projections were revised up significantly.
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