Economy
This is shaping up to be a pretty poor year for home sales, according to the Wall Street Journal. In fact, the recent reports out on new and existing home sales has us on track to be the worst year for home sales since 1995. Not helping things is the fact that mortgage rates continue to climb, heading back north of 6.5% this week. In a bit of good news, the weekly jobless claims report out on Thursday showed last week's new claims for unemployment insurance fell back to 227,000, which is about the average number for the last year. Initial jobless claims can give an indicator of early weakness in the labor market, but right now that's not an indicator flashing any warning signs. Next Friday, we'll get some more significant data on the labor market when we get the nonfarm payrolls and unemployment rate for the month of October.
Markets
The S&P 500 took a breather this week after rising for 6 weeks in a row. The index fell 0.96% for the week as the market is digesting gains over the past month or so. We're a little over a third of the way through earnings season, and so far it's been good, not great. Next week is going to get busy - 1/3rd of the companies that make up the S&P 500 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average will report, including five of the six largest publicly traded companies in the US. This is the stock market's equivalent of the Super Bowl if the Super Bowl took place four times per year.
What We're Reading
- Cut Your 2024 Taxes Before It's Too Late - WSJ
- 3 Steps to Uncovering Your True Financial Goals - Morningstar
Have a great weekend.
Dogwood Wealth Management