by Calculated Risk on 1/27/2022 08:25:00 PM

Friday:
• At 8:30 AM ET, Personal Income and Outlays for December. The consensus is for a 0.5% increase in personal income, and for a 0.5% decrease in personal spending. And for the Core PCE price index to increase 0.5%.

• At 10:00 AM, University of Michigan's Consumer sentiment index (Final for January). The consensus is for a reading of 68.6.

On COVID (focus on hospitalizations and deaths):

COVID Metrics
	Now	Week Ago	Goal
Percent fully Vaccinated	63.6%	---	≥70.0%1
Fully Vaccinated (millions)	211.2	---	≥2321
New Cases per Day3	596,859	744,805	≤5,0002
Hospitalized3	139,974	145,650	≤3,0002
Deaths per Day3🚩	2,288	1,829	≤502
1 Minimum to achieve "herd immunity" (estimated between 70% and 85%). 2my goals to stop daily posts, 37-day average for Cases, Currently Hospitalized, and Deaths 🚩 Increasing 7-day average week-over-week for Cases, Hospitalized, and Deaths ✅ Goal met.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the daily (columns) and 7-day average (line) of positive tests reported.

New cases and hospitalizations are now declining.

Unfortunately, deaths are still rising - now averaging over 2 thousand deaths per day - but below the previous 7-day average record of 3,421 in January 2021.