The key report this week is the July employment report.

Other key reports include ISM manufacturing and non-manufacturing indexes, July vehicel sales, and the Trade deficit for June.

----- Monday, August 3rd -----
10:00 AM: ISM Manufacturing Index for July. The consensus is for the ISM to be at 54.0, up from 52.6 in June.

Here is a long term graph of the ISM manufacturing index.

The employment index was at 42.1% in June, and the new orders index was at 56.4%.

10:00 AM: Construction Spending for June. The consensus is for a 1.3% increase in construction spending.

----- Tuesday, August 4th -----
Early: Light vehicle sales for July from the BEA. The consensus is for light vehicle sales to be 13.1 million SAAR in July, up from 13.0 million in June (Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate).

This graph shows light vehicle sales since the BEA started keeping data in 1967. The dashed line is the sales rate for last month.

8:00 AM ET: Corelogic House Price index for June

----- Wednesday, August 5th -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

8:15 AM: The ADP Employment Report for July. This report is for private payrolls only (no government). The consensus is for 1.25 million payroll jobs added in July, up from 2.369 million added in June.

8:30 AM: Trade Balance report for June from the Census Bureau.

This graph shows the U.S. trade deficit, with and without petroleum, through the most recent report. The blue line is the total deficit, and the black line is the petroleum deficit, and the red line is the trade deficit ex-petroleum products.

The consensus is the trade deficit to be $50.3 billion.  The U.S. trade deficit was at $54.6 Billion the previous month.

10:00 AM: the ISM non-Manufacturing Index for July.   The consensus is for a reading of 54.8, down from 57.1.

----- Thursday, August 6th -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released. The early consensus is for a 1.400 million initial claims, down from 1.434 million the previous week.

11:00 AM: NY Fed: Q2 Quarterly Report on Household Debt and Credit

----- August 7th -----
8:30 AM: Employment Report for July.   The consensus is for 1.36 million jobs added, and for the unemployment rate to decrease to 10.7%.

There were 4.8 million jobs added in June, and the unemployment rate was at 11.1%.

This graph shows the job losses from the start of the employment recession, in percentage terms.

The current employment recession is by far the worst recession since WWII in percentage terms, and the worst in terms of the unemployment rate.