Monthly Cycle of Economic Data

Below: current week's releases in BLUE; Data BETTER or WORSE than expected

Release Date	Data Series	Previous Value or Change	Expected Value or Change	Actual Value or Change	12-Month Change	Chart
4/29	CB Consumer Confidence - Apr	64.5	62.0	62.3	-44.0
4/30	GDP Change, apr - Q1 advance	+0.6%	+0.5%	+0.6%	+2.5%
4/30	GDP Implicit Price Deflator, apr	+2.4%	+3.0%	+2.6%	+2.2%
4/30	Employment Cost Index, NOT APR - Q1	+0.8%	+0.8%	+0.7%	+3.3%
5/1	Wkly Init Unempl Claims - 4/26	345K	375K	380K	4-wk avg 363K
5/1	Personal Income - Mar	+0.5%	+0.4%	+0.3%	+4.0%
5/1	Personal Consumption Expend	+0.1%	+0.2%	+0.4%	+5.3%
5/1	PCE Core Deflator - Mar	+0.1%	+0.1%	+0.2%	+2.1%
5/1	ISM Manufacturing Index - Apr	48.6	48.0	48.6	-6.1
5/1	Construction Spending - Mar	-0.3%	-0.5%	-1.1%	-3.4%
5/1	Auto & Lt Truck Sales, saar - Apr	15.19M		14.4M	-11.7%
5/2	Unemployment Rate - Apr	5.1%	5.2%	5.0%	+0.5%
5/2	Non-Farm Payrolls - Apr	-81K	-75K	-20K	+462K
5/2	Average Hourly Earnings - Apr	+0.3%	+0.3%	+0.1%	+3.7%
5/2	Average Hrs Worked/Wk - Apr	33.8	33.7	33.7	-0.1
5/2	Total Factory Orders - Mar	-1.3%	+0.2%	+1.4%	+3.7%
5/2	Interest Rates, past 2-1/2 years		Treasury Yield Curve
5/5	ISM Non-Manufacturing Index - Apr	49.6	50.0	52.0	-4.0
5/7	Non-Farm Productiv, apr - Q1 prelim	+1.9%	+1.5%	+2.2%	+3.2%
5/7	Unit Labor Costs, apr - Q1 prelim	+2.6%		+2.2%	+0.2%
5/7	Consumer Credit - Mar	+$5.2B	+$6.0B	+$15.3B	+5.9%
5/8	Wkly Init Unempl Claims - 5/3	383K	375K	365K	4-wk avg 366K
5/9	Int'l Balance of Trade - Mar	-$62.3B	-$61.3B
5/13	Retail Sales - Apr	+0.2%
5/13	Retail Sales excl Autos	+0.1%
5/14	Consumer Price Index, seas adj - Apr	+0.3%
5/14	CPI Core Rate, seas adj	+0.2%
5/15	Industrial Production Index - Apr	+0.3%
5/15	Capacity Utilization - Apr	80.5%
5/16	UM Consumer Sent - May prelim	62.6
5/16	Building Permits, saar - Apr	927K
5/16	Housing Starts, saar - Apr	974K
5/19	Leading Economic Indicators - Apr	+0.1%
5/20	Producer Price Index, seas adj - Apr	+1.1%
5/20	PPI Core Rate, seas adj	+0.2%
5/23	Existing Home Sales, saar - Apr	4.93M
5/27	New Home Sales, saar - Apr	526K
5/28	Durable Goods Orders - Apr	-0.3%
5/28	Dur Goods Orders, excl Transp	+1.5%
5/30	UM Consumer Sent - May final	62.6
saar = Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate

The following list of economic data includes the 10 Leading Indicators used in calculating the Conference Board's Index of Leading Indicators, plus one of four Coincident Indicators. THE INDICATORS SHOWN ON THE CHARTS WITH THE PLOTTED DATA ARE NOT THOSE USED BY THE CONFERENCE BOARD IN CALCULATING THEIR LEADING OR COINCIDENT INDICES.

Positive or negative readings below are determined using calculations of standard deviations or moving averages described on each chart. These are calculations that I have decided to use after examining the indicators' performance with data covering at least the past 40 years. This is in large measure curve fitting, though these indicators, by their very natures, tend to lead the economy as a whole. Also, note that release dates of several of these indicators lag by 2 or even 3 months.

MONTHLY DATA	CURRENTLY	CHART
Leading Indicators
Avg Hours Worked/Week in Manufacturing	POSITIVE
Avg of Weekly Initial Unemployment Claims	NEGATIVE
500 stocks (avg of S&P 500 closes for month)	NEGATIVE
Spread between 10-yr T-note and Fed Funds	NEGATIVE
U of Michigan Consumer Expectations	NEGATIVE
Vendor Performance - Slow Deliveries	NEGATIVE
Building Permits - New Private Housing	NEGATIVE
Factory Orders - Consumer Goods	POSITIVE
Factory Orders - Non-Defense Capital Goods	POSITIVE
M2 Money Supply - in constant 1996 $	POSITIVE

Martin Capital Advisors, LLP is not responsible for the accuracy of the data contained in any of these charts or indicators. This information is provided for informational purposes only.