Durable goods up 3x over expectations for May

Fox Business is reporting that "orders for durable goods rose 1.1% in May, beating expectations of a rise of 0.4%."

Consumer confidence down for fifth month in row

This is not surprising. The media is looking in the wrong places for indicators. It's not the stock market, which has a life of its own. It's not the economic experts who write the columns and the books and talk on TV. They are not out and about, seeing the empirical evidence. One of the problems is that the government has been like the little boy crying wolf for so long that no one believes any Democrat. And the Republicans are so focused on winning in November that there aren't any of them that will say anything positive. This is why the party system as we know it has to go. Both parties' missions have nothing to do with making life any easier for any of us. Ask any of your friends if they go to any malls where they don't see tons of people. Ditto for restaurants. Downshifting a vehicle does not make it stop. It means that it is adapting to new road conditions. That's what's going on with the economy right now. Downshifting. But, again, the big thing is that it is no one's best interest to say that the economy is doing well and picking up. No one will believe the Dems and the R's ain't gonna say it.

Stock market run wild is driving our lives?

Here's a book description for Dark Pools.

So we are all working our asses off and a couple of jerks who manipulate bots are driving what happens with the economy?

Hello? This is what Jefferson and Hamilton and Madison wanted?

A news-breaking account of the global stock market's subterranean battles, Dark Pools portrays the rise of the "bots"- artificially intelligent systems that execute trades in milliseconds and use the cover of darkness to out-maneuver the humans who've created them. In the beginning was Josh Levine, an idealistic programming genius who dreamed of wresting control of the market from the big exchanges that, again and again, gave the giant institutions an advantage over the little guy. Levine created a computerized trading hub named Island where small traders swapped stocks, and over time his invention morphed into a global electronic stock market that sent trillions in capital through a vast jungle of fiber-optic cables. By then, the market that Levine had sought to fix had turned upside down, birthing secretive exchanges called dark pools and a new species of trading machines that could think, and that seemed, ominously, to be slipping the control of their human masters. Dark Pools is the fascinating story of how global markets have been hijacked by trading robots--many so self-directed that humans can't predict what they'll do next.

Dark Pools: High-Speed Traders, A.I. Bandits, and the Threat to the Global Financial System

Kroger says it is going to start adding stores

Kroger Co. said last week that 2012 could mark the reversal of a trend in store-count decline that the company has seen for the past several years. Read More: http://supermarketnews.com/retail-amp-financial/kroger-eyes-new-store-growth-after-years-declines#ixzz1yuVNG3qK

House prices up in April

Fox is reporting this; The S&P/Case-Shiller composite index of 20 metropolitan areas shows home prices rose 1.3% in April on a non-seasonally adjusted basis, a significantly bigger increase than the 0.5% expected. The gauge fell by 1.9% in April from the same month a year earlier, less than the 2.5% decline expected.

New home sales shoot up in May

(Reuters) - New single-family home sales surged in May to a one-year high and prices rose from a year ago amid tightening supply, further signs the housing market was gaining some momentum. More on rising new home sales

Jobless claims down slightly last week

New claims for unemployment benefits fell to 387,000 last week from an upwardly revised 389,000 the week prior. Claims were expected to fall to 380,000 from an initially reported 386,000. Source: Fox Business

Housing permits up in May

Housing permits rose 7.9% to a 780,000-unit rate, the highest since September 2008 and above economists' forecasts of a 728,000-unit rate. Housing starts, however, were down.

GDP not cutting it as composite metric any more

There is a shared recognition that conventional indicators such as gross domestic product (GDP) are failing to capture the scope countries' wealth. Even in the global recession, many economies appear to be getting wealthier. More on GDP as a failing metric.

June home builder sentiment highest in five years: NAHB