1st Quarter GDP; March’s income and outlays, durable goods, and housing starts
The key economic releases from government agencies during the past week were the Advance Estimate of 1st quarter GDP and the concurrent March report on Personal Income and Spending , both from the Bureau of Economic Analysis; other widely watched releases included the March advance report on durable goods and the March report on New Residential Construction , both from the Census bureau… Major privately issued reports released during the week included the February Case-Shiller Home Price Index from S&P Case-Shiller, which indicated that their index of the relative average of December, January and February home prices was 0.7% higher than their index of average prices for the same homes that sold during the same 3 month period of a year earlier; the light vehicle sales report for April from Wards Automotive , which estimated that vehicles sold at a 16.4 million annual rate in April, up from the 16.3 million sales rate in March, but down from the 17.27 million annual sales rate re...