Year-Over-Year Contract Signings for Pending Home Sales Jumped 7.4%
The National Association of Realtors (NAR) Pending Home Sales Index (PHSI) rebounded in November, rising 1.2% from October to 108.5. Year-over-year contract signings jumped 7.4%.
The PHSI stood at 106.7 in October and was expected to gain slightly less than the reading. Forecasts ranged from a low of 0.0% to a high of 1.5%. The consensus was looking for a gain of 1.1%.
An index of 100 is equal to the level of contract activity in 2001.
Regionally, the West posted the highest rate of growth in November. While the other three major U.S. regions saw marginal changes in monthly contract activity, pending home sales gained both nationally and in all regions compared to one year ago.
“Despite the insufficient level of inventory, pending home contracts still increased in November,” said Lawrence Yun, NAR’s chief economist, noting that housing inventory has been in decline for six straight months dating back to June 2019. “The favorable conditions are expected throughout 2020 as well, but supply is not yet meeting the healthy demand.”
The consensus at the NAR Real Estate Forecast Summit called for home prices to rise by 3.6% in 2020 after gaining 5% in 2019.
“Sale prices continue to rise, but I am hopeful that we will see price appreciation slow in 2020,” Mr. Yun added. “Builder confidence levels are high, so we just need housing supply to match and more home construction to take place in the coming year.”
The PHSI in the Northeast slid 0.1% to 96.3 in November, which is 2.6% higher than last year. In the Midwest, the index rose 1.0% to 102.5, 5.0% higher than in November 2018.
Pending home sales in the South ticked down slightly by 0.2% to 125.0 in November, though are still 7.7% higher than November 2018. In the West, the PHSI jumped 5.5% to 98.4, a solid gain of 14.0% from a year ago.
Import, Export, Logistics concept – Map global partner connection of Container Cargo freight ship for Logistic Import Export background (Photo: AdobeStock/Elements of this image furnished by NASA)
The U.S. trade in goods deficit unexpectedly narrowed to $63.2 billion in November, down 5.4% or $3.6 billion from $66.8 billion in October. Exports of goods were up $0.9 billion to $136.4 billion, while imports of goods were down $2.7 billion to $199.6 billion.
Forecasts ranged from a low of $-70.0 billion to a high of $-65.0 billion. The consensus forecast was calling for a widening to $-69.5 billion.
In October, the overall U.S. trade deficit—or, the balance for goods and services—narrowed to only $47.2 billion. Depending on services for November, the decline in the goods deficit could provide a boost to quarterly gross domestic product (GDP).
Toxicologists Ruled Out Chlorine, OPCW Management Accused of Doctoring Reports, Deleting Dissenting Opinions
Syria Chemical Weapons Graphic
On April 7, 2018, the Syrian government under Bashar al-Assad allegedly carried out a chemical weapons attack against rebel forces in Douma, Syria. In response, the United States (US), United Kingdom (UK), and France carried out airstrikes against government targets on April 14.
The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) sent a team to investigate the widely-condemned attack, largely alleged by the rebels and backed by their western allies.
The OPCW Fact-Finding Mission (FFM) claimed their findings “provide reasonable grounds that the use of a toxic chemical as a weapon took place. This toxic chemical contained reactive chlorine. The toxic chemical was likely molecular chlorine.” (2.17)
The investigation “included: (a) on-site visits; (b) chemical detection; (c) environmental sample collection and receipt; (d) biomedical sample collection and receipt; and (e) witness and casualty interviews, including on Syrian territory.”
However, newly-leaked documents and whistleblower allegations cast serious doubt on the credibility of the OPCW, the FFM, and their findings involving the alleged chemical weapons attack in Douma, Syria.
Leaked Engineering Assessment
A previously leaked engineering assessment conducted by Ian Henderson, which did not support the findings, was omitted in the final report. Mr. Henderson refuted key findings surrounding the industrial cylinders found at both locations.
He concluded it is unlikely the cylinders were dropped by air, a delivery method implicating the Assad Regime.
In October, the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks published a statement made by a panel that listened to testimony and reviewed evidence from a whistleblower, and the engineering assessment.
“The convincing evidence of irregular behaviour in the OPCW investigation of the alleged Douma chemical attack confirms doubts and suspicions I already had,” Dr José Bustani, the first Director-General of the OPCW and member of the panel said. “Even official reports of investigations seemed incoherent at best.”
“The picture is certainly clearer now, although very disturbing.”
The panel called upon the OPCW to allow “all inspectors who took part in the Douma investigation to come forward” at a forum for the States Parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Redacted Report Misrepresents Original Version
On November 23, WikiLeaks published an internal email dated June 22, 2018, in which a member of the fact-finding mission expressed “grave concern” about the redacted report.
The author of the email addressed to Chief of Cabinet Robert Fairweather accuses the OPCW of misrepresenting the facts by selectively omitting evidence. The email also reveals this deception was done “at the best of the ODG,” or the Office of the Director General.
At that time, the position if ODG was held by Turkish diplomat Ahmet Üzümcü, who has since been replaced by Fernando Arias of Spain.
The email also mentions there is “a major deviation from the original report” regarding whether there was sufficient evidence to determine the presence of “chlorine, or another reactive chlorine-containing chemical.”
New Team, New Conclusions
On December 24, documents showing internal disagreement were published. A memorandum addressed to Director General Fernando Arias and dated March 14, 2019, protests the findings and backs up a previous memo claiming roughly 20 inspectors expressed concerns over the final report.
The March 20 memo states the final report “did not reflect the views of the team members that deployed to Douma.” Of the original FFT members, only one allegedly contributed to the final version of the report. It reflects the views of an almost entirely new team referred to as the “FFM core team.”
“In subsequent weeks I found that I was being excluded from the work, for reasons not made clear,” the author of the memo states.
“In conclusion, I must stress that I hold no opinion, interest or strong views on the technical part of the matter, nor any interest in the political outcomes. My interest is in sound technical rigour; the science, engineering and facts will speak for themselves.”
Remove All Traces of Ian Henderson
On Friday, WikiLeaks released an email exchange dated February 27 – 28. Sebastien Braha, Chief of Cabinet at the OPCW, instructs the team to “remove all traces” of the engineering report written by Mr. Henderson from the secure registry.
Again, Mr. Henderson concluded that the industrial cylinders were likely manually placed at both locations, not airdropped.
Symptoms Inconsistent With Chlorine Exposure
Another leaked document details the minutes from a June 6, 2018, meeting between four OPCW staff members and “three Toxicologists/Clinical pharmacologists, one bioanalytical and toxicological chemist”.
The purpose was to assess whether exhuming the victims’ bodies would be necessary, and “whether the symptoms observed in victims were consistent with exposure to chlorine or other reactive chlorine gas.”
The OPCW team did not have direct access to examine dead bodies. Members could not enter Douma until two weeks after the incident. But more importantly, “the symptoms observed were inconsistent with exposure to chlorine and no other obvious candidate chemical causing the symptoms could be identified”.
“With respect to the consistency of the observed and reported symptoms of the alleged victims with possible exposure to chlorine gas or similar, the experts were conclusive in their statements that there was no correlation between symptoms and chlorine exposure.”
Timeline for Alleged Chemical Weapons Attack in Douma, Syria
The U.S. Labor Department reported initial jobless claims fell 18,000 to a seasonally adjusted 234,000 for the week ending December 21. The 4-week average increased by 2,250 to 228,000.
Forecasts ranged from a low of 215,000 to a high of 235,000. The consensus forecast was 223,000.
The advance seasonally adjusted insured unemployment rate remained unchanged at a very low 1.2% for the week ending December 14.
The advance number for seasonally adjusted insured unemployment during the week ending December 14 declined 6,000 from the week prior to 1,719,000. The 4-week moving average was 1,703,500, an increase of 19,250.
No state was triggered “on” the Extended Benefits program during the week ending December 7.
The highest insured unemployment rates in the week ending December 7 were in Alaska (2.8), West Virginia (2.2), New Jersey (2.1), Puerto Rico (2.1), Pennsylvania (2.0), California (1.9), Connecticut (1.9), Montana (1.9), Washington (1.8), Illinois (1.7), and Minnesota (1.7).
The largest increases in initial claims for the week ending December 14 were in West Virginia (+397), Illinois (+278), Idaho (+188), North Dakota (+124), and Kentucky (+70), while the largest decreases were in New York (-6,288), Texas (-5,612), Pennsylvania (-4,726), Wisconsin (-3,770), and Georgia (-2,997).
With McConnell’s Help, President Trump Has Notched Three Records In Three Years For Most Federal Appeals Judges Appointed
President Donald Trump speaks to the press alongside Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R), Republican of Kentucky, in the Rose Garden of the White House in Washington, DC, October 16, 2017. (Photo: Reuters)
President Donald J. Trump has set another record for the appointment of federal judges in his third year, and has done so each year since his inauguration.
In total, President Trump has put 187 judges on the federal bench. The surpasses the 169 and 166 new judges George W. Bush and Bill Clinton placed in their first three years, respectively.
In addition to appointing Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court (SCOTUS), President Trump also placed 133 district court judges, 50 circuit court judges, and another 2 on the U.S. Court of International Trade.
U.S. Courts of Appeals
There are 13 appellate courts that sit below the U.S. Supreme Court. Ninety-four federal judicial districts are organized into 12 regional circuits, each of which has a court of appeals.
The thirteenth is the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit. It has nationwide jurisdiction to hear appeals in specialized cases.
For many plaintiffs, the U.S. Courts of Appeals—the nation’s second-highest court—will have the final say unless the High Court decides to hear their case.
When President Trump took office, nine of those 13 circuit courts were dominated by Democratic appointees. Now, seven of them are Republican-appointed majorities.
On November 14, the U.S. Senate approved a nominee to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in Manhattan. That appointment flipped the court from a Democratic- to a Republican-appointed majority.
On December 10 and 11, the U.S. Senate approved Patrick Bumatay, 40, and Lawrence VanDyke, 47, to sit on the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. The San Francisco-based Ninth Circuit was among the most liberal in the land.
The Atlanta-based Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals has also been flipped to a Republican-appointment majority. It hears appeals from Alabama, Georgia and Florida, but has been dominated by Democratic appointees.
The 50 total circuit-court judicial appointments for Mr. Trump are by far the most for any modern president’s first term. Barack Obama boasted just half that number (25) at this point in his first term. In fact, at the end of his eight years, Mr. Obama had appointed 55.
While more than 1 in 4 circuit court judges were appointed by President Trump, two-thirds of the slots he filled were previously held by Republican-appointed judges.
Previous Records
Worth noting, President Trump and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kty., have been reshaping these federal courts, together.
On December 14, 2017, President Trump set a record for the most federal appeals judges confirmed during the first year of a presidency. The U.S. Senate confirmed the twelfth nominee that day, breaking the previous record held jointly by Presidents Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy.
In August 2018, the U.S. Senate confirmed the nominations of Julius Ness Richardson (81 – 8) and A. Marvin Quattlebaum Jr. (62 – 28), both for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.
With those two confirmations, President Trump and Leader McConnell had pushed through 26 federal appeals court judge confirmations. It was two more than the previous year’s record and the highest number for a second-year presidency.
Future Vacancies and the 2020 Election
There remains just one circuit court vacancy left to fill, though more could open up in 2020. But more consequential will be the vacancies to fill over the next four years.
Democrats have long resisted making judicial appointments a campaign issue for two reasons. First, voter intensity tends to work against them.
In 2016, President Trump handily won voters who cited U.S. Supreme Court appointments as “most important” to their vote, and was the choice for voters who found it “important” to their vote.
Second, polls consistently show voters overall do not agree with judicial activism. For instance, voters viewed Justice Gorsuch as more “mainstream” than Mr. Obama’s appointees.
However, the break-neck pace by which Mr. Trump has filled circuit court vacancies has resulted in increased focus on the judiciary as an issue. The impact of that scrutiny could be less certain.
New Residential Sales, While Volatile, Have Shown Steady Strength
New homes sales came in at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 719,000 in November, up 1.3% (±11.0%) from last month and 16.9% (±19.4%) year-over-year.
The October rate was revised from 733,000 to a still solid 710,000.
Builder confidence is at a 20-year high, new residential construction statistics are strong, and volatile new home sales have been steadily rising to their best level in 12 years.
The consensus forecast called for steady strength at 735,000. Forecasts ranged from a low of 715,000 to a high of 750,000.
The median sales price of new houses sold in November 2019 was $330,800. The average sales price was $388,200.
The seasonally‐adjusted estimate of new houses for sale at the end of November was 323,000. This represents a supply of 5.4 months at the current sales rate.
The Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) rose from -0.71 to 0.56 for November, beating forecasts and indicating the U.S. economy rebounded. That jump in economic growth was driven in no small part by production-related indicators.
All four broad categories of indicators increased from October and two made positive contributions to the index in November.
Production-related indicators added +0.49 to the CFNAI in November, up from –0.60 in October. The Federal Reserve reported industrial production rose 1.1% in November after a strike-driven 0.9% decline in October.
The contribution of the sales, orders, and inventories category to the CFNAI ticked up to –0.04 in November from –0.05 in October.
Employment-related indicators contributed +0.12 to the CFNAI in November, up from –0.07 in October.
The Labor Department reported total nonfarm payrolls rose by 266,000 in November after increasing by an upwardly revised 156,000 in October. The unemployment rate ticked down to 3.5% in November from 3.6%.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kty., took to the floor of the U.S. Senate and issued a warning following the impeachment of President Donald J. Trump. He appealed to senatorial pride and warned against ignoring the historic role the upper chamber plays in moments of “partisan fervor.”
On Wednesday, Democrats in the U.S. House approved two articles of impeachment over bipartisan objection.
Here are a few statements from Leader McConnell’s speech:
If the Senate blesses this low bar for impeachment, we’ll invite the impeachment of every future president.
House Democrats want to embrace new rules for this president because they feel uniquely enraged.
But long after the partisan fervor of this moment has passed, the damage to this republic will remain.
If the Senate blesses this slapdash impeachment, then we invite an endless parade of impeachable trials.
We’d be giving future Houses of either party new power to paralyze the Senate at their whim.
If the Senate blesses this, and if the nation accepts this, impeachments will cease to be a once in a century event.
Real statesmen would’ve recognized—no matter how you view this president—this would upend our entire system.
It would be an unprecedented constitutional crisis if the Senate agrees to set the bar this low, forever.
It’s clear what this moment requires. It requires us to fulfill our purpose. The framers designed the Senate to take the longview for our republic.
The Senate exists for moments like this. That’s why this body has the ultimate say in impeachments. The framers knew the House would be too vulnerable to violent emotions and transient factionalism.
Democrats’ Partisan Views Continue to Weigh Down Historic Optimism
The final reading on consumer sentiment for December ticked up 0.1 from the prelim to 99.3, beating the forecast range for the Survey of Consumers.
The Sentiment Index gained nearly three points from 96.8 in November and has averaged 97.0 under the Trump Administration, the highest sustained level since the all-time record in the late 1990s.
“Inflation expectations declined in the December survey, with both the year-ahead and five-year expected inflation rates falling,” said Richard Curtain, chief economist for Survey of Consumers.
“For the year-ahead, an annual inflation rate of 2.3% was expected, the lowest since 2.2% was recorded twice, in December 2016 and September 2010 prior to the Great Recession’s lows.”
The Current Economic Conditions Index jumped to 115.5, up from the preliminary reading of 115.2 earlier this month and from 111.6 in November. The Index of Consumer Expectations matched the preliminary reading at 88.9, up from 87.3 in November.
“Over the next five years, consumers expected an annual inflation rate of just 2.2% in December 2019, the lowest level since this question was first introduced in the late 1970s,” Mr. Curtain added.
Personal Outlays Gain Even as Personal Saving Rate Ticks Slightly Higher
The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) reported personal income rose $101.7 billion (0.5%) in November, exceeding the forecast range. The gain was primarily driven by better compensation for employees, as well as farm proprietors’ income, and personal interest income.
Forecasts ranged from a low of 0.2% to a high of 0.4%. The consensus forecast was 0.3%.
Disposable personal income (DPI) rose $87.7 billion (0.5%) and consumer spending continued to come in stronger than expected. Personal consumption expenditures (PCE) gained $64.9 billion (0.4%).
Forecasts ranged from a low of 0.2% to a high of 0.5%. The consensus forecast for spending was 0.4%.
Real DPI and real PCE rose 0.4% and 0.3%, respectively. The PCE price index increased 0.2%. Excluding food and energy, the PCE price index increased 0.1%.
The $37.8 billion increase in real PCE reflected an increase of $22.6 billion in spending for goods and a $17.1 billion increase in spending for services.
Personal outlays increased overall by $68.6 billion in November.
Personal saving was $1.31 trillion in November and the personal saving rate—personal saving as a percentage of disposable personal income—rose slightly to 7.9%.
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