by Calculated Risk on 3/16/2012 09:15:00 AM

From the Fed: Industrial production and Capacity Utilization

Industrial production was unchanged in February after having risen 0.4 percent in January. Previously, industrial production was reported to have been unchanged in January. Manufacturing output moved up 0.3 percent in February. ... At 96.2 percent of its 2007 average, total industrial production for February was 4.0 percent above its year-earlier level. Capacity utilization for total industry edged down to 78.7 percent, a rate 1.2 percentage points above its level from a year earlier but 1.6 percentage points below its long-run (1972--2011) average.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows Capacity Utilization. This series is up 11.3 percentage points from the record low set in June 2009 (the series starts in 1967).

Capacity utilization at 78.7% is still 1.6 percentage points below its average from 1972 to 2010 and below the pre-recession levels of 81.3% in December 2007. Capacity utilization for January was revised up from 78.5% to 78.8%.

Note: y-axis doesn't start at zero to better show the change.

The second graph shows industrial production since 1967.

Industrial production was unchanged in February at 96.2; however January was revised up 0.4%.

The consensus was for a 0.4% increase in Industrial Production in February, and for an increase to 78.8% (from 78.5%) for Capacity Utilization. Although below consensus, with the January revisions, this was close to expectations.

All current manufacturing graphs

by Calculated Risk on 3/16/2012 08:30:00 AM

From the BLS:

The Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers (CPI-U) increased 0.4 percent in February on a seasonally adjusted basis, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Over the last 12 months, the all items index increased 2.9 percent before seasonal adjustment.

The gasoline index rose sharply in February, accounting for over 80 percent of the change in the all items index. ...

The index for all items less food and energy rose 0.1 percent in February after increasing 0.2 percent in January.

I'll post a graph later today after the Cleveland Fed releases the median and trimmed-mean CPI. This was below the consensus forecast of a 0.5% increase in CPI and a 0.2% increase in core CPI.

by Calculated Risk on 3/15/2012 08:25:00 PM

Jed Kolko, Trulia's chief economist writes about housing seasonality today: Springtime for Housing

The housing market rides the seasons. Year in and year out, market activity has predictable ups and downs. Sometimes those seasonal patterns are hard to see when longer-term trends (like plummeting housing prices) or one-off events (like the homebuyer tax credit) drive movements in prices, sales and other housing indicators. But seasonal patterns are there, even when they’re beneath the surface.
...
In this post, I look at five measures of housing activity: search activity, asking prices, new construction starts, existing home sales and housing inventory.
...
The chart below shows that sales are typically 29% above their annual average in June and 31% below their annual average in January. Construction starts also swing 25% above and below their annual average over the year. ... Search activity rises 12% above its annual average in March. But inventories stay within 10% of their annual average every month, and asking prices stay within 5% of their annual average every month.

Click on graph for larger image.

This is one of three graphics in Kolko's post. Note that Kolko is using asking prices, and not a repeat sales index like Case-Shiller.

This shows housing is definitely seasonal, especially starts, sales and searches. The other graphics show when activity is high and low for each measure (searches peak in March and stay high through August), and when prices peak by region (earlier in the south, later in the north).

by Calculated Risk on 3/15/2012 05:24:00 PM

From DataQuick: Bay Area February Home Sales at Five-year High

A total of 5,702 new and resale houses and condos sold in the nine-county Bay Area in February. That was up 4.1 percent from 5,479 in January, and up 14.2 percent from 4,991 in February 2011. The year-over-year sales increase was the eighth in a row, according to San Diego-based DataQuick.
...
Last month distressed property sales – the combination of foreclosure resales and “short sales” – made up about half of the Bay Area’s resale market.

Foreclosure resales ... accounted for 27.4 percent of resales in February. That was up from a revised 27.2 percent in January, and down from 32.6 percent a year ago.

Short sales ... made up an estimated 23.1 percent of Bay Area resales last month. That was down slightly from an estimated 23.5 percent in January – the high point for this cycle – and up from 20.1 percent a year earlier.
...
Last month absentee buyers – mostly investors – purchased a record 26.0 percent of all Bay Area homes sold, up from a revised 25.2 percent in January and 23.4 percent a year ago.

Still over 50% of the market is "distressed". Here is an update to Tom Lawler's table of selected high distressed sales markets including the Bay Area. With the exception of Reno, the distressed share of sales is down from February 2011, the share of short sales has increased and the share of foreclosure sales are down:

	Short Sales Share		Foreclosure Sales Share		Total "Distressed" Share
	12-Feb	11-Feb	12-Feb	11-Feb	12-Feb	11-Feb
Las Vegas	29.3%	26.6%	42.0%	51.6%	71.3%	78.2%
Reno	28.0%	30.0%	42.0%	36.0%	70.0%	66.0%
Phoenix	28.1%	21.1%	23.3%	49.6%	51.4%	70.7%
Sacramento	31.9%	22.1%	33.9%	49.2%	65.8%	71.3%
Minneapolis	15.0%	13.6%	42.3%	47.9%	57.3%	61.5%
Mid-Atlantic (MRIS)	16.4%	14.5%	17.5%	27.2%	33.9%	41.7%
Orlando	33.3%	23.7%	28.9%	49.9%	62.2%	73.6%
Southern California	20.5%	19.7%	32.5%	37.0%	53.0%	56.7%
Bay Area, California	23.1%	20.1%	27.4%	32.6%	50.5%	52.7%

The NAR will report February existing home sales next week on Wednesday March 21st.

by Calculated Risk on 3/15/2012 01:33:00 PM

From CoreLogic: CoreLogic® Reports More Than 860,000 Completed Foreclosures Nationally in the Last Twelve Months

CoreLogic ... today released its National Foreclosure Report for January, which provides monthly data on completed foreclosures, foreclosure inventory and 90+ delinquency rates. There were 69,000 completed foreclosures in January 2012, compared to 80,000 in January 2011, and 65,000 in December 2011. The number of completed foreclosures for the previous twelve months was 860,128. From the start of the financial crisis in September 2008, there have been approximately 3.3 million completed foreclosures.
...
Approximately 1.4 million homes, or 3.3 percent of all homes with a mortgage, were in the foreclosure inventory as of January 2012 compared to 1.5 million, or 3.6 percent, in January 2011 and 1.4 million, or 3.4 percent, in December 2011. Nationally, the number of loans in the foreclosure inventory decreased by 145,000, or 9.5 percent in January 2012 compared to January 2011. The foreclosure inventory is the stock of homes in the foreclosure process.

This is a new monthly report and will help track the number of completed foreclosures.

Note: The sequence is 1) a loan goes delinquent, 2) if it doesn't cure, after several months, the foreclosure process begins (this is called the "foreclosure inventory"), 3) then the foreclosure is completed and becomes REO (lender Real Estate Owned), and then 4) the REO is sold. Sometimes, during this process, the loan will cure or a short sale approved, so not all loans in the foreclosure inventory are future "completed foreclosures".

So when CoreLogic reports "completed foreclosures", they are discussing the number of homes moving from the foreclosure process to REO.