Unemployment

Consumer confidence dropped to the seven's month low while the consumer spending has hit ten months high. I was always under impression that consumers supposed to spend less when they are less confident, and they usually spend more when they more confident.

I would say that overall we have good economic reports. Almost all current bad economic data (excluding unemployment) are narrowed to the point that they are actually positive and are better than before, yet the press tells us that investors would be happier if economic reports would be better. So far, we do not see any points to the dramatic bankruptcies of stock market giants which suggest that overall stock market is quite healthy.

Unemployment is an another story. With growing technology it is obvious that on many working places functions and procedures previously performed by humans are now performed by robots and computers. 2008 recession has pushed many companies to lay off employees and many of these companies have found that they could achieve the same productivity with less human resources. Keep in min that company will always prefer to have more robotus and computerized technologies which means less expenses, less trouble with unions, etc. Because of that, we should expect to see unemployment at the same level for a while (on mine opinion). The public companies and stock market will be "ok" with it.

Case-Shriller Index

The Standard & Poor's Case-Shriller U.S. National Home Price Index is updated on the monthly basis on the last Tuesday of each month at 9:00 AM ET and is a composite of single-family home price indices for the nine U.S. Census divisions. The Case-Shriller consists of 20 metropolitan area indices and two composite indices. The index is based on single-family home re-sales ( co-ops and condominiums are exempted as is new construction) with two or more sales transactions and is used to measure changes in existing home prices. The Case-Shriller index is normalized to have a value of 100 in January 2000.

Financial Analysis

Analysis of the financial reports has become quite popular among intraday traders. The fact that in many cases we may see increased volatility on the indexes (S&P 500, Russell 2000, Nasdaq 100, DJI, and etc) has attracted futures and options traders. Simple trading strategy of placing options spreads bet before an economic report release helps to achieve desired result.

In order to properly make a call (place a trade) a trader needs several things: a) history of the index behavior during previous similar economic reports; b) expected economic data for coming reports; c: real time index charts with volume. You need to watch volume on the indexes as increase in volume would confirm volatile trading in response on report's release.

GDP Reports

Key economic data for the last week of May 2010 starting May 24th, 2010.

Economic Calendar key:
Consensus represents the market consensus estimate for each indicator.
Prior represents the last actual for each indicator.

Date	Release	For	Consensus	Prior
05/24/10 10:00 AM	Existing Home Sales	Apr		5.65M	5.4M
05/25/10 9:00 AM	Case-Shiller 20-city Index	Mar		2.8%	0.6%
05/25/10 10:00 AM	Consumer Confidence	May		58.3	57.9
05/25/10 10:00 AM	FHFA Housing Price Index	Mar		NA	-0.2%
05/26/10 8:30 AM	Durable Orders	Apr		1.4%	-0.3%
05/26/10 8:30 AM	Durable Orders ex Transportation	Apr		0.5%	3.5%
05/26/10 10:00 AM	New Home Sales	Apr		425	411
05/26/10 10:30 AM	Crude Inventories	05/22		NA	0.162M
05/27/10 8:30 AM	GDP - Second Estimate	Q1		3.3%	3.2%
05/27/10 8:30 AM	GDP Deflator - Second Estimate	Q1		0.9%	0.9%
05/27/10 8:30 AM	Initial Claims	05/22		455K	NA
05/27/10 8:30 AM	Continuing Claims	05/22		4600K	NA
05/28/10 8:30 AM	Personal Income	Apr		0.4%	0.3%
05/28/10 8:30 AM	Personal Spending	Apr		0.3%	0.6%
05/28/10 8:30 AM	PCE Prices - Core	Apr		0.1%	0.1%
05/28/10 9:45 AM	Chicago PMI	May		60.0	63.8
05/28/10 9:55 AM	U. Michigan Consumer Sentiment	May		73.7	73.3

Calendar key:
Actual refers to the actual figures after t

Options Expiration

Key economic data for the third week of May 2010 starting April 17th, 2010. The coming week is an options expiration week. As a rule, during options expiration higher volatility could be expected.

Economic Calendar key:
Consensus represents the market consensus estimate for each indicator.
Prior represents the last actual for each indicator.

Date	Release	For	Consensus	Prior
05/17/10 9:00 AM	Net Long-Term TIC Flows	Feb	40.0	47.1
05/18/10 8:30 AM	Building Permits	Apr	680K	680K
05/18/10 8:30 AM	Core PPI	Apr	0.1%	0.1%
05/18/10 8:30 AM	Housing Starts	Apr	656K	626K
05/18/10 8:30 AM	PPI	Apr	0.1%	0.7%
05/19/10 8:30 AM	Core CPI	Apr	0.0%	0.0%
05/19/10 8:30 AM	CPI	Apr	0.1%	0.1%
05/19/10 10:30 AM	Crude Inventories	05/15	NA	1.95M
05/20/10 8:30 AM	Continuing Claims	05/15	4600K	4627K
05/20/10 8:30 AM	Initial Claims	05/15	440K	444K
05/20/10 10:00 AM	Leading Indicators	Apr	0.2%	1.4%
05/20/10 10:00 AM	Philadelphia Fed	May	21.3	20.2

Calendar key:
Actual refers to the actual figures after their release.

Export/Import

Key economic data for the second week of May 2010 starting May 11th, 2010. There are no economic reports on Monday May 10, 2010

Economic Calendar key:
Consensus represents the market consensus estimate for each indicator.
Prior represents the last actual for each indicator.

Date	Release	For	Consensus	Prior
05/11/10 10:00 AM	Wholesale Inventories	Mar	0.5%	0.6%
05/12/10 2:00 PM	Treasury Budget	Apr	-$20.0B	-$20.9B
05/12/10 8:30 AM	Trade Balance	Mar	-$40.0B	-$39.7B
05/12/10 10:30 AM	Crude Inventories	05/08	NA	2.75M
05/13/10 8:30 AM	Continuing Claims	05/08	4590K	4594K
05/13/10 8:30 AM	Initial Claims	05/08	440K	444K
05/13/10 8:30 AM	Export Prices ex-ag.	Apr	NA	0.6%
05/13/10 8:30 AM	Import Prices ex-oil	Apr	NA	0.2%
05/14/10 8:30 AM	Retail Sales	Apr	0.2%	1.9%
05/14/10 8:30 AM	Retail Sales ex-auto	Apr	0.5%	0.9%
05/14/10 9:15 AM	Capacity Utilization	Apr	73.8%	73.2%
05/14/10 9:15 AM	Industrial Production	Apr	0.6%	0.1%
05/14/10 9:55 AM	Mich Sentiment	May	73.5	72.2
05/14/10 10:00 AM	Business Inventories	Mar	0.4%	0.5%

Auto and Truck Sales Report on Monday

Key economic data for the First week of May 2010 starting may 3rd, 2010.

Economic Calendar key:
Consensus represents the market consensus estimate for each indicator.
Prior represents the last actual for each indicator.

Date	Release	For	Consensus	Prior
05/03/10 2:00 PM	Auto Sales	Apr	4.2M	4.3M
05/03/10 2:00 PM	Truck Sales	Apr	4.6M	4.8M
05/03/10 8:30 AM	Personal Income	Mar	0.3%	0.0%
05/03/10 8:30 AM	Personal Spending	Mar	0.6%	0.3%
05/03/10 10:00 AM	Construction Spending	Mar	-0.3%	-1.3%
05/03/10 10:00 AM	ISM Index	Apr	60.0	59.6
05/04/10 10:00 AM	Factory Orders	Mar	-0.2%	0.6%
05/04/10 10:00 AM	Pending Home Sales	Mar	5.0%	8.2%
05/05/10 8:15 AM	ADP Employment Change	Apr	30K	-23K
05/05/10 10:00 AM	ISM Services	Apr	56.1	55.4
05/05/10 10:30 AM	Crude Inventories	05/01	NA	1.96M
05/06/10 8:30 AM	Continuing Claims	05/01	4600K	4645K
05/06/10 8:30 AM	Initial Claims	05/01	440K	448K
05/06/10 8:30 AM	Productivity-Prel	Q1	2.4%	6.9%
05/07/10 3:00 PM	Consumer Credit	Mar	-$3.9B	-$11.5B
05/07/10 8:30 AM	Unemployment Rate	Apr	9.7%	9.7%
05/07/10 8:30 AM	Nonfarm Payrolls	Apr	187K	162K
05/07/10 8:30 AM	Average Workweek	Apr	34.0	34.0
05/07/10 8:30 AM	Hourly Earnings	Apr	0.1%	-0.1%

Consumer Confidence

Key economic data for the last week of April 2010 starting April 27th, 2010. There are no economic reports on April 26th, 2010.

Economic Calendar key:
Consensus represents the market consensus estimate for each indicator.
Prior represents the last actual for each indicator.

Date	Release	For	Consensus	Prior
04/27/10 9:00 AM	Case-Shiller 20-city Index (y/y)	Feb	1.1%	-0.7%
04/27/10 10:00 AM	Consumer Confidence	Apr	53.7	52.5
04/28/10 2:15 PM	FOMC Rate Decision	4/28	0.25%	0.25%
04/28/10 10:30 AM	Crude Inventories	04/24	NA	1.89M
04/29/10 8:30 AM	Continuing Claims	04/17	4625K	4646K
04/29/10 8:30 AM	Initial Claims	04/24	440K	456K
04/30/10 8:30 AM	GDP-Adv.	Q1	3.2%	5.6%
04/30/10 8:30 AM	Chain Deflator-Adv.	Q1	0.9%	0.5%
04/30/10 8:30 AM	Employment Cost Index	Q1	0.5%	0.5%
04/30/10 9:45 AM	Chicago PMI	Apr	59.8	58.8
04/30/10 9:55 AM	Mich Sentiment	Apr	71.5	69.5

New Home Sales

Key economic data for the third week of April 2010 starting April 19th, 2010. The coming week is not rich on economic reports.

Economic Calendar key:
Consensus represents the market consensus estimate for each indicator.
Prior represents the last actual for each indicator.

Date	Release	For	Consensus	Prior
04/19/10 10:00 AM	Leading Indicators	Mar	1.0%	0.1%
04/21/10 10:30 AM	Crude Inventories	04/17	NA	-2.20M
04/22/10 8:30 AM	Initial Claims	04/17	455K	484K
04/22/10 8:30 AM	Continuing Claims	04/10	4600K	4639K
04/22/10 8:30 AM	PPI	Mar	0.5%	-0.6%
04/22/10 8:30 AM	Core PPI	Mar	0.1%	0.1%
04/22/10 10:00 AM	Existing Home Sales	Mar	5.30M	5.02M
04/22/10 10:00 AM	FHFA Home Price Index	Feb	-0.2%	-0.6%
04/23/10 8:30 AM	Durable Orders	Mar	0.2%	0.9%
04/23/10 8:30 AM	Durable Orders ex auto	Mar	0.6%	1.4%
04/23/10 10:00 AM	New Home Sales	Mar	325K	308K

Beige Book

Key economic data for the second week of April 2010 starting April 12th, 2010. The coming week is not rich on economic reports. Next week is an options expiration week.

Economic Calendar key:
Consensus represents the market consensus estimate for each indicator.
Prior represents the last actual for each indicator.

Date	Release	For	Consensus	Prior
04/12/10 2:00 PM	Treasury Budget	Mar	$67.5B	-$191.6B
04/13/10 8:30 AM	Export Prices ex-ag.	Mar	NA	-0.2%
04/13/10 8:30 AM	Import Prices ex-oil	Mar	NA	0.2%
04/13/10 8:30 AM	Trade Balance	Feb	-$39.0B	-$37.3B
04/14/10 2:00 PM	Fed's Beige Book	Apr	NA	NA
04/14/10 8:30 AM	CPI	Mar	0.1%	0.0%
04/14/10 8:30 AM	Core CPI	Mar	0.1%	0.1%
04/14/10 8:30 AM	Retail Sales	Mar	1.1%	0.3%
04/14/10 8:30 AM	Retail Sales ex-auto	Mar	0.5%	0.8%
04/14/10 10:00 AM	Business Inventories	Feb	0.3%	0.0%
04/14/10 10:30 AM	Crude Inventories	04/10	NA	1.98M
04/15/10 8:30 AM	Continuing Claims	04/03	4600K	4550K
04/15/10 8:30 AM	Initial Claims	04/10	440K	460K
04/15/10 9:00 AM	Net Long-Term TIC Flows	Jan	NA	$19.1B
04/15/10 9:15 AM	Capacity Utilization	Mar	73.3%	72.7%
04/15/10 9:15 AM	Industrial Production	Mar	0.7%	0.1%
04/15/10 10:00 AM	Philadelphia Fed	Apr	20.0	18.9
04/16/10 8:30 AM	Building Permits	Mar	626K	637K
04/16/10 8:30 AM	Housing Starts	Mar	610K	575K
04/16/10 9:55 AM	Mich Sentiment	Apr	75.0	73.6