A Quarter-Point Is Already Priced. The September Dot Plot Is What the Fed Still Has to Decide
Futures put roughly nine-in-ten odds on the Federal Open Market Committee lifting its target range on Wednesday, and 86 of 101 economists in a Reuters poll agree. The open question is what the Summary of Economic Projections says about everything after that — and whether an inflation problem driven by gasoline justifies a policy rate aimed at core.
More top stories
Stocks Snap Their Skid on Friday, but the Holiday-Shortened Week Still Ends Lower After August CPI
Consumer Sentiment Falls to 47.8 in September's Preliminary Read as Year-Ahead Inflation Expectations Jump to 4.6%
Wholesale prices rose 0.4% in August, with diesel behind more than a third of the goods increase
Latest coverage
Stocks Snap Their Skid on Friday, but the Holiday-Shortened Week Still Ends Lower After August CPI
All four major US benchmarks closed higher Friday as crude eased and the August inflation report landed, yet every one of them finished the four-session week down. Core CPI ran hotter than the consensus Schwab cited, and futures pricing for next week's FOMC moved sharply toward a hike.
Consumer Sentiment Falls to 47.8 in September's Preliminary Read as Year-Ahead Inflation Expectations Jump to 4.6%
The University of Michigan's expectations component did nearly all of the damage, dropping 5.7 points while current conditions slipped 1. The reading landed the same morning the BLS reported gasoline accounted for over a third of the monthly all-items CPI increase.
Wholesale prices rose 0.4% in August, with diesel behind more than a third of the goods increase
The Bureau of Labor Statistics said Thursday that final demand producer prices rose 0.4% in August on a seasonally adjusted basis and 5.4% over the 12 months before adjustment, with the goods side up 1.1% and the services side up just 0.1%. The BLS traces more than a third of the goods increase to diesel fuel, which jumped 24.1% — a cost that sits inside freight, farming and construction bills rather than on a store shelf.
TSMC's August revenue rose 53.3% in NT dollars to a monthly record, and its deputy COO says it still cannot meet demand
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing reported August consolidated revenue of NT$514,806 million, up 53.3% from a year earlier in New Taiwan dollars and about 10.1% from July, lifting January-August sales 39.3% year over year. Deputy Co-Chief Operating Officer Cliff Hou told Bloomberg the company is chasing four to five times its capacity and still cannot catch up, and it is building roughly 20 fabs at once against a historical pace of four or five.
Existing-home sales fell 2% in August as equity breadth narrowed to 36% above the 50-day line
The National Association of Realtors said Thursday that August existing-home sales slipped 2.0% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.98 million, down 1.2% from a year earlier, with inventory at 4.9 months of supply. The rate-sensitive corners of the stock market are telling a matching story: Charles Schwab, in a market update published as of 9:22 a.m. ET Thursday, counted only 36% of S&P 500 members above their 50-day moving average, down from 47% the previous Friday.
Three coupon settlements, a corporate tax date and an FOMC meeting all land on Sept. 15
Fed staff published new estimates last month for how hard Treasury settlement pushes on repo rates once reserves stop being abundant. Next Tuesday supplies the test, and the Fed will be in blackout when it happens.
Corporate borrowers face a split screen: spreads near their tights, all-in yields at multi-year highs
Investment-grade spreads have sat at 81 basis points every session so far in September while average high-grade yields ran above 5.5 percent. The gap explains why treasurers are pulling 2027 funding into 2026, and why the window narrows this Friday.
A 1930 statute nobody had used is now setting tariffs on Canada. Friday's CPI will barely register it.
The 50 percent Section 338 duties took effect Aug. 22, leaving only the last ten days of the August price collection window. Canada's dollar-for-dollar answer landed Tuesday, and it does not touch US consumer prices directly at all.
Markets
Stocks Snap Their Skid on Friday, but the Holiday-Shortened Week Still Ends Lower After August CPI
All four major US benchmarks closed higher Friday as crude eased and the August inflation report landed, yet every one of them finished the four-session week down. Core CPI ran hotter than the consensus Schwab cited, and futures pricing for next week's FOMC moved sharply toward a hike.
Three coupon settlements, a corporate tax date and an FOMC meeting all land on Sept. 15
Fed staff published new estimates last month for how hard Treasury settlement pushes on repo rates once reserves stop being abundant. Next Tuesday supplies the test, and the Fed will be in blackout when it happens.
Rate futures head into the Fed's blackout window with a September hike still a live question
Short-dated Treasury yields rose on Friday after the August employment report landed far above forecasts. With Fed officials now barred from public comment until Sept. 17, futures pricing has become the only running commentary on the Sept. 15-16 meeting.
Hike Odds Climb Past 60% and US Crude Slides Under $90 as the Tape Splits After Payrolls
CME FedWatch pricing for a September increase rose to 60.2% Friday from 49.4% Thursday, the Associated Press reported. On AP's morning snapshot the two-year Treasury yield led the move while the 10-year held steady, and benchmark US crude fell 2.6% to $88.96 a barrel.
Stocks
Existing-home sales fell 2% in August as equity breadth narrowed to 36% above the 50-day line
The National Association of Realtors said Thursday that August existing-home sales slipped 2.0% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 3.98 million, down 1.2% from a year earlier, with inventory at 4.9 months of supply. The rate-sensitive corners of the stock market are telling a matching story: Charles Schwab, in a market update published as of 9:22 a.m. ET Thursday, counted only 36% of S&P 500 members above their 50-day moving average, down from 47% the previous Friday.
Energy holds a 42% year-to-date lead as Hormuz strikes push Brent back toward $97
The S&P 500 energy sector was up 42.3% for 2026 as of Aug. 31, more than any other sector by a factor of nearly three. Weekend strikes on tankers in the Strait of Hormuz have since pushed crude back toward late-July levels.
Best Buy, Dollar General and Dollar Tree All Raised Full-Year Guidance — and Tariff Refunds Are Inside Two of the Three Margin Stories
Dollar Tree said $1.31 of its $2.70 quarterly EPS came from net tariff refunds. Dollar General cited refunds among the drivers of a 127-basis-point gross margin gain. Best Buy's beat leaned on computing and consumer electronics.
Salesforce Booked $11.3 Billion in the July Quarter and Lifted Its Full-Year Range by $200 Million
Current remaining performance obligation reached $33.5 billion, up 14% in constant currency, and the company said combined Agentforce and Data 360 annual recurring revenue is approaching $3.9 billion.
Economy
A Quarter-Point Is Already Priced. The September Dot Plot Is What the Fed Still Has to Decide
Futures put roughly nine-in-ten odds on the Federal Open Market Committee lifting its target range on Wednesday, and 86 of 101 economists in a Reuters poll agree. The open question is what the Summary of Economic Projections says about everything after that — and whether an inflation problem driven by gasoline justifies a policy rate aimed at core.
Consumer Sentiment Falls to 47.8 in September's Preliminary Read as Year-Ahead Inflation Expectations Jump to 4.6%
The University of Michigan's expectations component did nearly all of the damage, dropping 5.7 points while current conditions slipped 1. The reading landed the same morning the BLS reported gasoline accounted for over a third of the monthly all-items CPI increase.
Wholesale prices rose 0.4% in August, with diesel behind more than a third of the goods increase
The Bureau of Labor Statistics said Thursday that final demand producer prices rose 0.4% in August on a seasonally adjusted basis and 5.4% over the 12 months before adjustment, with the goods side up 1.1% and the services side up just 0.1%. The BLS traces more than a third of the goods increase to diesel fuel, which jumped 24.1% — a cost that sits inside freight, farming and construction bills rather than on a store shelf.
A 1930 statute nobody had used is now setting tariffs on Canada. Friday's CPI will barely register it.
The 50 percent Section 338 duties took effect Aug. 22, leaving only the last ten days of the August price collection window. Canada's dollar-for-dollar answer landed Tuesday, and it does not touch US consumer prices directly at all.
Tech
TSMC's August revenue rose 53.3% in NT dollars to a monthly record, and its deputy COO says it still cannot meet demand
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing reported August consolidated revenue of NT$514,806 million, up 53.3% from a year earlier in New Taiwan dollars and about 10.1% from July, lifting January-August sales 39.3% year over year. Deputy Co-Chief Operating Officer Cliff Hou told Bloomberg the company is chasing four to five times its capacity and still cannot catch up, and it is building roughly 20 fabs at once against a historical pace of four or five.
Marvell, Workday and Autodesk All Grew Revenue by Double Digits on Aug. 27 - but Backlog and Guidance Drove the After-Hours Reaction
Marvell's data center business grew 46% year over year, Workday's subscription revenue rose 13.9%, and Autodesk's revenue climbed 16%. Investors focused on backlog and guidance rather than the quarters themselves.
Nvidia Cleared Its Own $91.0 Billion Guide With $96.2 Billion, Then Called for $108 Billion in the October Quarter
The July quarter came in about 5.7% above the range Nvidia set in May, Data Center revenue reached $89.0 billion, and the company again built its outlook assuming no Data Center compute revenue from China.
Nvidia reports after Wednesday's close against a $91.0bn guide, with options pricing a 5.4% move
The company's own outlook for the July quarter, issued in May, was $91.0 billion plus or minus 2 percent. Options are pricing a smaller post-earnings swing than they did three months ago and smaller than the stock's average move over the past twelve reports.
Analysis
Corporate borrowers face a split screen: spreads near their tights, all-in yields at multi-year highs
Investment-grade spreads have sat at 81 basis points every session so far in September while average high-grade yields ran above 5.5 percent. The gap explains why treasurers are pulling 2027 funding into 2026, and why the window narrows this Friday.
Two Line Items - Restaurants and School Districts - Account for Most of August's 162,000
Food services and drinking places added 59,000 jobs and local government education 42,000, together 101,000 of the month's 162,000. Information payrolls fell 23,000 and health care hiring ran well under its own 12-month average.
Jobless Claims Edge Up to 206,000 as Announced Layoffs Jump 58% From July
Weekly filings rose by 2,000 and continuing claims ticked higher, while Challenger, Gray & Christmas counted 52,881 announced August job cuts — sharply above July but still well under last year's pace. Friday's August payroll report is the next test.
The Wage Channel Is the Weakest Link in the Case for a September Rate Increase
ADP put median base pay growth for workers who stayed in their jobs at 3.0 percent in August, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics had average hourly earnings running at 3.2 percent in the year to July. Whatever is keeping inflation above target, the pay data published so far does not look like a wage-price spiral, which complicates the argument for tightening into a labour market that is visibly narrowing.
More coverage
Payrolls Rose 162,000 in August, and July's Reported Job Loss Was Revised Into a Gain
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported a hiring gain roughly three times what forecasters expected and lifted June and July by a combined 55,000. The unemployment rate was unchanged at 4.1%.
Hike Odds Climb Past 60% and US Crude Slides Under $90 as the Tape Splits After Payrolls
CME FedWatch pricing for a September increase rose to 60.2% Friday from 49.4% Thursday, the Associated Press reported. On AP's morning snapshot the two-year Treasury yield led the move while the 10-year held steady, and benchmark US crude fell 2.6% to $88.96 a barrel.
Two Line Items - Restaurants and School Districts - Account for Most of August's 162,000
Food services and drinking places added 59,000 jobs and local government education 42,000, together 101,000 of the month's 162,000. Information payrolls fell 23,000 and health care hiring ran well under its own 12-month average.
Services Activity Accelerates in August While ISM's Price Gauge Climbs to Its Highest Since 2022
The Institute for Supply Management's services index rose to 55.4% in August, with business activity at its strongest reading since late 2022. Its prices measure climbed to 72.6% and its employment gauge contracted for a second straight month.
Jobless Claims Edge Up to 206,000 as Announced Layoffs Jump 58% From July
Weekly filings rose by 2,000 and continuing claims ticked higher, while Challenger, Gray & Christmas counted 52,881 announced August job cuts — sharply above July but still well under last year's pace. Friday's August payroll report is the next test.
Trade Gap Widens 24% to $88.6 Billion in July as Capital-Goods Imports Hit a Record
Computers, computer accessories and semiconductors tied to the AI buildout pushed capital-goods imports to $140.3 billion. The Atlanta Fed's tracker now shows net exports subtracting more than a percentage point from third-quarter growth.
ADP Puts August Private Payroll Growth at 38,000, Below the 48,000 Economists Expected
The payroll processor's August tally came in about 10,000 below the consensus estimate reported by Fox Business, which did not identify the survey compiler. Manufacturing and professional services shed positions, and education and health services alone added more than the entire net gain. The report is a private-sector estimate built from ADP's own client payrolls, not a preview of the Bureau of Labor Statistics count due Friday, and the two series have diverged sharply in recent months.
The 30-Year Treasury Closed September's First Session at 5.27%, Level With the 20-Year and Near Two-Decade Highs
Treasury's official par yield curve put both the 20-year and the 30-year bond at 5.27 percent on Tuesday, September 1, leaving 88 basis points between the two-year and the long bond. The pressure is not a purely American story: Bloomberg reported the same session that German 30-year yields were at their highest since 2011, the UK equivalent at levels last seen in 1998, and Australian long yields at a record in data going back to 2016.
The Wage Channel Is the Weakest Link in the Case for a September Rate Increase
ADP put median base pay growth for workers who stayed in their jobs at 3.0 percent in August, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics had average hourly earnings running at 3.2 percent in the year to July. Whatever is keeping inflation above target, the pay data published so far does not look like a wage-price spiral, which complicates the argument for tightening into a labour market that is visibly narrowing.
Factory Growth Cools to 54.6% in August While July Job Openings Edge Up to 7.27 Million
The ISM Manufacturing PMI slipped a full point from July's 55.6% and undershot the Reuters consensus, with new orders and backlogs leading the decline. The Prices Index did not budge from 71.1%, and a separate Labor Department survey showed job openings holding roughly flat on the month.
September Opens on the Back Foot as Crude Climbs and the Long End Holds Near Multi-Year Highs
US stocks were lower across the board in Tuesday morning trade after two tankers were struck near the Strait of Hormuz overnight, sending crude higher and the volatility index up more than 6%. Monday's session had already closed lower, with the Dow shedding 374 points even as August ended as a winning month.
Analysis: The One Number in the ISM Report That Didn't Move — Prices at 71.1% for a 23rd Month of Increases
Every major component of August's ISM manufacturing survey softened except the cost gauge, which held exactly where it was in July. Steel, aluminum and petroleum-based inputs are doing the work, and the sources of all three are largely outside the Federal Reserve's reach.
Crude Jumps After U.S. Strike on Larak Island as Energy Leads a Lower Tape
U.S. Central Command said American forces hit two Iranian launchers on Larak Island; Iran struck back at bases in Jordan. Brent traded above $91 and WTI above $86 in Monday morning dealing, and energy shares were the standout sector on a broadly lower morning tape. The August monthly close is not set until 4 p.m. ET.
Jobs Week Opens With a Hike Roughly Half-Priced: JOLTS and ISM Tuesday, August Payrolls Friday
The Bureau of Labor Statistics is scheduled to publish July job openings on Tuesday and the August Employment Situation at 8:30 a.m. ET on Friday, September 4. July payrolls fell 23,000 and May and June were revised down by a combined 103,000, leaving the first full data week of September to test a Fed at which three of the twelve voters already wanted to tighten in July.
The Two-Year Did the Repricing: 14 Basis Points on Friday, and a Flatter Curve Into September
Treasury's own par yield series shows the two-year note jumping to 4.34 per cent on August 28 from 4.20 per cent the day before, while the 30-year moved four basis points. The spread between two- and 10-year yields narrowed to 39 basis points, and the Russell 2000 fell 1.39 per cent while the Dow was flat.
Warsh Uses First Jackson Hole Speech to Warn the Fed Has "Work to Do" on Inflation; Rate-Hike Odds for Next Month Rise to 50% From 35%
The Fed chair told the Kansas City Fed's symposium that 2 percent is a firm, fixed target and that the central bank bears responsibility for 65 months of elevated inflation. Short-dated Treasury yields rose intraday as futures repriced.
Marvell, Workday and Autodesk All Grew Revenue by Double Digits on Aug. 27 - but Backlog and Guidance Drove the After-Hours Reaction
Marvell's data center business grew 46% year over year, Workday's subscription revenue rose 13.9%, and Autodesk's revenue climbed 16%. Investors focused on backlog and guidance rather than the quarters themselves.
Best Buy, Dollar General and Dollar Tree All Raised Full-Year Guidance — and Tariff Refunds Are Inside Two of the Three Margin Stories
Dollar Tree said $1.31 of its $2.70 quarterly EPS came from net tariff refunds. Dollar General cited refunds among the drivers of a 127-basis-point gross margin gain. Best Buy's beat leaned on computing and consumer electronics.
Nvidia Cleared Its Own $91.0 Billion Guide With $96.2 Billion, Then Called for $108 Billion in the October Quarter
The July quarter came in about 5.7% above the range Nvidia set in May, Data Center revenue reached $89.0 billion, and the company again built its outlook assuming no Data Center compute revenue from China.
Salesforce Booked $11.3 Billion in the July Quarter and Lifted Its Full-Year Range by $200 Million
Current remaining performance obligation reached $33.5 billion, up 14% in constant currency, and the company said combined Agentforce and Data 360 annual recurring revenue is approaching $3.9 billion.
Initial Claims Fell to 203,000 and Continuing Claims Dropped to 1.78 Million, a Day Before the Payroll Benchmark Revision
The insured unemployment rate stayed at 1.2% in Labor Department data released Thursday. The figures measure people losing jobs, not people finding them, and Friday brings a much larger revision to the payroll record.
Core PCE inflation held at 3.3% in July as real consumer spending barely moved
The Bureau of Economic Analysis released July personal income and outlays and the second estimate of second-quarter GDP at 8:30 a.m. Eastern on Wednesday, with the Census Bureau's advance durable goods report out the same morning. Real spending rose less than 0.1 percent, the saving rate sat at 3.0 percent and second-quarter growth stayed at a 1.5 percent annual rate.
Nvidia reports after Wednesday's close against a $91.0bn guide, with options pricing a 5.4% move
The company's own outlook for the July quarter, issued in May, was $91.0 billion plus or minus 2 percent. Options are pricing a smaller post-earnings swing than they did three months ago and smaller than the stock's average move over the past twelve reports.
A $1.61bn investment gain lifted Zoom's GAAP EPS to $5.15 while revenue grew 4.9%
Zoom Communications reported fiscal second-quarter revenue of $1.277 billion on Tuesday afternoon. Almost all of the fourfold jump in GAAP net income came from gains on strategic investments, not from the operating business, where GAAP operating income fell year over year.
Consumer Confidence Slipped to 89.4 in August. The Part About Today Got Better and the Part About Tomorrow Got Worse.
The Conference Board's headline index fell 0.8 points, but the Present Situation Index rose to 121.2 while the Expectations Index dropped to 68.2. More consumers said jobs were plentiful; fewer expected their income to rise.
The Payroll Benchmark Revision Lands at 10 a.m. Friday. That Is About the Same Minute Warsh Is Expected at the Jackson Hole Podium.
BLS will publish the preliminary benchmark estimate for March 2026 on Friday at 10 a.m. ET. Last year's preliminary figure was minus 911,000 — and the final came in about 50,000 jobs shallower.
Nvidia Guided to $91.0 Billion While Assuming Zero China Data-Center Compute. Wednesday Tests Both Halves of That Sentence.
The company reports fiscal second-quarter results after Wednesday's close for a quarter that ended July 26. Its own outlook and the published consensus sit within about a percentage point of each other — which puts the weight on everything that isn't the revenue line.
Iran Sanctions and New Canada Tariffs Split Monday's Tape as Wall Street Waits on Nvidia and Jackson Hole
Stocks opened Monday pulling in two directions, with technology lagging while industrials held up, as traders waited on a Treasury sanctions announcement on Iran, absorbed the collapse of U.S.-Canada trade talks and the 50% tariffs that followed, and positioned ahead of Nvidia's Wednesday results and the Jackson Hole symposium. Figures for Monday are intraday and the session is still open; Friday's closes are the last settled levels.
50% U.S. Tariffs on About $20 Billion of Canadian Goods Took Effect Aug. 22; Ottawa Says Matching Duties Begin Sept. 8
Three days of talks in Washington collapsed late Friday, and duties of 50% on roughly $20 billion of Canadian products — about 5% of Canada's exports — took effect at 12:01 a.m. ET Saturday, Aug. 22. Prime Minister Mark Carney says Canada will match them dollar for dollar starting Sept. 8, a date still ahead. Two-way goods trade ran to $376 billion in the first half of 2026, and the first inflation reading whose reference month overlaps the new duties will not arrive until late September.
Wednesday Stacks July PCE, the Second Q2 GDP Estimate and Durable Goods at 8:30 a.m. — Then Nvidia Reports After the Close
Three federal releases share one 8:30 a.m. ET slot on Aug. 26, and the company that makes up 7.50% of the Vanguard S&P 500 ETF reports that evening. The advance second-quarter GDP estimate put growth at a 1.5% annual rate with the PCE price index running at 5.1%. Nvidia's own guidance calls for revenue of $91.0 billion, plus or minus 2%. Fed Chair Kevin Warsh's Jackson Hole keynote follows two days later.
Bessent says the buybacks could run past $4 billion per issue. The long end gave back about half his relief rally inside a day.
One day after Treasury doubled planned repurchases of longer-dated debt to $4 billion per operation, the 30-year yield gave back about half of the decline it had just made, and the Treasury secretary went on television to say the size could go higher still. The 30-year touched 5.33 percent on Tuesday, a 19-year high, fell to 5.183 percent on the announcement, and was last trading at 5.24 percent late Thursday — still below where it stood before Treasury spoke.
Initial claims fell 6,000 to 206,000. The four-week average rose anyway. The rolling window, not the labor market, explains the contradiction.
The Labor Department's August 20 release showed seasonally adjusted initial claims down 6,000 to 206,000 while the four-week moving average rose 4,250 to 204,000. The week that dropped out of the window carried 189,000 claims, a figure the department's own table prints — 17,000 below the week that replaced it, and 17,000 divided by four is exactly the 4,250 move.
The Philadelphia Fed's six-month outlook index is the highest since August 1983. Its current price gauges fell — but not one firm reported paying less.
August's Manufacturing Business Outlook Survey put current general activity at 47.4, a five-year high, and future general activity at 73.6, which the bank calls its highest reading since August 1983. Prices paid fell 13 points to 40.9, yet zero percent of respondents reported a decrease, and the forward prices-paid index sits 22 points above the current one.
Treasury Doubles Long-End Liquidity Buybacks to at Least $4 Billion an Operation, Starting September 9
The Treasury Department raised the size of its nominal long-end liquidity support buyback operations from a $2 billion maximum to at least $4 billion apiece in the 10- to 20-year and 20- to 30-year sectors, effective September 9 through November 4. Long-dated yields fell on the announcement, with wire services putting the 30-year down roughly 9 to 10 basis points on the day.
July FOMC Minutes: Nine-Three Vote, 'Many Participants' Saw Tightening Ahead if Inflation Stalls, and a Proposal to Cut to Six Meetings a Year
The Federal Reserve released the July 28-29 minutes at 2:00 p.m. Eastern Wednesday. Three reserve bank presidents dissented in favor of a quarter-point increase while the Committee held the target range at 3-1/2 to 3-3/4 percent, and the Chairman floated moving from the eight scheduled meetings a year on the Board's published calendar to six.
Two Authorities, One Curve: Treasury Bids the Long End on the Same Day the Fed's Minutes Lean Tighter
Between August 3 and August 17 the 2-year constant-maturity yield fell 6 basis points while the 30-year rose 8, steepening 2s30s by 14 basis points to 112. On Wednesday the Treasury moved to support the long end and the FOMC minutes showed three dissents for a hike at the short end.
The 30-Year's 2026 Selloff Is 43 Basis Points of Real Yield and 2 of Inflation Compensation
Treasury publishes two long-end curves. Subtract one from the other and this year's move at the back of the curve is almost entirely a real-rate story.
Import Prices Fell 0.4% in July. Strip Out Fuel and the 12-Month Rate Is the Fastest Since 2022.
Tuesday's BLS release has two properties most readers will skip: it excludes duties, and none of it is seasonally adjusted.
U.S. Housing Starts Sank 12.4% in July as Building Permits Climbed
New home construction fell to a 1.24 million annual pace in July even as building permits rose, the Census Bureau reported, underscoring a construction sector still squeezed by affordability.
Foreign Official Flows Swung $88.3 Billion in June. The Headline TIC Number Moved $2.0 Billion.
Treasury's June capital-flows report, out at 4 p.m. Monday, showed a net TIC inflow of $133.5 billion against a May figure the same release revised to $131.5 billion. Inside that near-identical total, the official line went from a $39.9 billion outflow to a $48.4 billion inflow while private inflows fell by half. Treasury's own footnote warns that the official-private division carries a "transaction bias."
July Housing Starts Due Tuesday After Builder Sentiment Ticks Up to 35 in August
The Census Bureau publishes July new residential construction at 8:30 a.m. ET Tuesday, a day after the NAHB/Wells Fargo index rose one point to 35. June's 19.0 percent jump in total starts was almost entirely multifamily, and neither report settles whether single-family building has stopped drifting lower.
Business Applications Rose 8.1% in July. On Our Arithmetic, Retail Trade Accounts for Almost All of the Gain.
The Census Bureau's July Business Formation Statistics show one industry row up 44.5 percent in a single month. The series that requires an applicant to name a first wages-paid date went the other way.
The Philadelphia Fed's Forecaster Panel Lowered Its Recession Odds in Every Quarter Both Surveys Covered. It Also Cut This Quarter's Job-Gain Pace.
The Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia published its Third Quarter 2026 Survey of Professional Forecasters on Friday. The 32-forecaster panel marked down the probability of a negative GDP quarter in all four quarters the two surveys share, raised its near-term growth path, and trimmed its estimate of monthly payroll gains this quarter to 45,600.
Banks Told the Fed Their Business Loan Standards Now Sit Easier Than Their Post-2005 Midpoint. Subprime Card Standards Went the Other Way.
Once a year the Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey asks banks not what they changed but where the level of their standards sits inside a two-decade range, and the July 2026 answers split business credit from consumer credit.
The New York Fed Calls It a Four-Year High. In the Same Table, the Orders and Shipments Indexes Both Fell.
The New York Fed's August factory survey landed Monday morning with a five-point jump in its main index. The indexes for the two components most people assume drive that number moved the other way — and the New York Fed's own overview page says the headline is not built from them.
Real Hourly Pay Fell 0.2% Over the Year. Real Weekly Pay Rose 0.1%. Both Numbers Are in BLS Table A-1.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics' Real Earnings release for July puts the over-the-year change in real average hourly earnings at negative and the over-the-year change in real average weekly earnings at positive. The entire gap is one-tenth of an hour on the workweek line — and the CPI figure the table uses is not the CPI figure in that morning's headline.
Treasury's Buyback Schedule Adds Up to Exactly $38 Billion. Two of the Operations Printed on It Don't Count.
The August refunding's buyback plan lists 18 liquidity-support operations, but only 16 belong to the new quarter, and the maximums reconcile to the dollar.
The Treasury Clearing Mandate Is 136 Days Away. Three Exemption Requests Are Still Open, and the Comment Windows Close Aug. 31.
The SEC's central clearing requirement for U.S. Treasury cash transactions takes effect Dec. 31, 2026. A statement from Commissioner Mark T. Uyeda dated Aug. 7 shows the Commission is still taking comment on three separate requests to carve pieces out of the rule, with all of those windows expected to close Aug. 31 — 122 days before the mandate bites. Two of the three were noticed in April, and the Commission has now reopened the comment period on both.
The Fed Added $333 Billion of Bills in a Year. Reserve Balances Fell $376 Billion.
The August 13 H.4.1 release shows the Federal Reserve's Treasury bill holdings at 2.7 times their year-earlier level, and its mortgage book down $190 billion, as the Desk swaps the portfolio's composition. Reserve balances fell anyway, because the Treasury General Account grew $460 billion over the same twelve months. And the New York Fed's newest purchase schedule, which took effect Friday, plans no reserve management purchases at all.
Net Interest Reached $963 Billion in the First Ten Months of Fiscal 2026
CBO's August 10 Monthly Budget Review puts net interest on the public debt at $963 billion for October through July, $117 billion more than a year earlier and ahead of both Medicare and the military. On the report's own timing-adjusted column, that one line accounts for more than half of the $209 billion rise in federal outlays.
The Foreign Holdings Data Lands Monday at 4 p.m. The Line That Has Been Moving Is the Official One
Treasury publishes June's international capital data on Monday, August 17. In the current table, foreign official holdings of Treasuries have fallen to $3,848.0 billion, the lowest of the thirteen months on the page, while the headline total sits within $118.3 billion of the highest column published.
The August Flash PMI Is Friday. The Numbers That Matter Are Buried Three Rows Down
S&P Global's preliminary US composite reading lands August 21. July left an unresolved argument inside it — the strongest private-sector growth since October 2025 alongside the fastest composite input-cost inflation since November 2022 — and the flash and final versions of that same month did not agree on how extreme the price story was. Here is what Friday can and cannot settle.
Jackson Hole Is on the Calendar for Aug. 27-29. The Agenda Isn't.
The Kansas City Fed has published the dates and the theme for the 2026 Economic Policy Symposium, Kevin Warsh's first as Fed chairman. It has not published a programme, a speaker list or a confirmed address by the chair. Last year's release offers a timing precedent; it does not offer a promise.
The Business Lending Boom Went Negative in July. The Mortgage Flatline Never Moved.
The Fed's H.8 release for the week ended Aug 5 shows commercial and industrial loans growing 12.2 percent in the first quarter and 14.2 percent in the second, both at seasonally adjusted annual rates. It also shows that run collapsing inside the quarter: 15.8 percent in April, 10.8 in May, 4.0 in June, and minus 1.1 percent in July. Residential mortgage credit, meanwhile, has barely moved all year, at 0.7 percent in the second quarter and 0.2 percent in July.
The Fed's Board Has Nobody Scheduled to Speak Next Week. A Three-Week-Old Document Will Have to Do.
The Federal Reserve Board's own August calendar lists no speeches or public appearances by Board officials between Monday the 17th and Friday the 21st. The only scheduled communication is Wednesday's 2:00 p.m. ET release of the July 28-29 minutes, a record of a 9-3 hold in which three officials dissented in favour of a rate hike. Since that meeting, markets have cut September hike odds hard — from 72.3% on CME's tool the day of the decision to 25% on Polymarket by August 15 — without hearing from a single Board official.
The Credit Card Delinquency Number Everyone Quotes Is Measuring Old Debt, Not New Distress
A New York Fed research post published August 11 reconciles three credit card delinquency measures that had drifted apart. The gap turns out to be a reporting artifact: charged-off balances now linger on credit reports twice as long as they once did.
The High-Yield Average Is Hiding Its Tail
The broad junk-bond index sits near the low end of its recent range. The CCC cohort sits above 1,000 basis points. As of Aug. 13, 2026, the distance between the two rating tiers was the widest of the year, and the two halves of the credit market are no longer describing the same borrowers.
The 30-Year Stopped at 5.216%. What the Tape Did Next Was Not a Straight Line.
Treasury's $25 billion long bond cleared at a high yield of 5.216% on August 13, the costliest long-dated borrowing since 2001. But the bond rallied roughly four basis points that same afternoon before giving it back Friday — and the widely circulated "6.6 basis point tail" is not a tail at all.
Two Tapes Disagreed With the Disinflation Story on Friday, and Both Were Energy and Rates
July CPI rose 0.1%, producer prices were unchanged and retail sales fell 0.6% — the cleanest week of soft data in months. Yet Treasury yields finished Friday above the Federal Reserve's official Thursday marks and crude gained more than 5% on the week. What follows is an account of that tension, and an unusually blunt accounting of where the price providers do not agree.
July's FOMC Minutes Land Wednesday. The Forecast Is Stale; the Conditions Are Not.
The Federal Reserve releases the record of its July 28-29 meeting on Aug. 19, after five data releases have already reshaped September pricing. What survives is not the committee's view of the economy but the conditional logic behind it — and under a chair who has scrapped forward guidance, that logic has few other places to appear.
Russell 2000 Closes at a Record as the Dow Finishes the Week Alone in the Red
Small caps set a closing high on a day the other three indexes slipped. The S&P 500 and Nasdaq stretched their weekly win streaks to three; the Dow did not join them.
Blockade Talk Lifts Crude While the IEA Cuts Both Sides of the Barrel
Washington threatened indefinite naval pressure on Iran and oil rose on the day and on the week. The agency's August report cut supply and demand at once, which is the harder problem for the Fed.
Consumer Sentiment Fell to 51.0 in Early August. Inflation Expectations Went the Other Way.
The University of Michigan's preliminary August index dropped 7.6% from July's final, expectations fell hardest, and only 8% of consumers now expect income to outpace inflation.
Reddit Joins the S&P 500 on Tuesday. The Mechanics Are the Story, Not the Pop.
S&P Dow Jones Indices adds RDDT before Tuesday's open in place of AvalonBay. J.P. Morgan puts the passive bid near 16.7 million shares — but the index effect is not what it used to be.
July Retail Sales Fell 0.6%. Read the Footnote Before You Read the Headline.
The Census Bureau's advance estimate put July retail and food services sales at $763.6 billion, down 0.6% from June against forecasts for a small gain. The asterisk everyone will point at is attached to the June revision, not to July's decline.
A Soft Consumer Print Lands Five Days Before the Hawks Get Their Minutes
Three Fed officials dissented in July in favor of a hike. The minutes of that meeting arrive Wednesday — and by then they will describe a committee that had not yet seen the jobs report, the inflation data or Friday's retail sales miss.
Friday's Consumer Doubleheader: Retail Sales at 8:30, Sentiment Stuck Near 55 at 10:00
July advance retail sales and the preliminary August University of Michigan sentiment index land ninety minutes apart, and the forecasting services cannot agree on what the second one should print. The gap between what households say and what they buy is the number that matters into the Sept. 15-16 FOMC.
The PPI Headline Cooled. The Core Didn't. The Fed's September Argument Is Still Live
July producer prices were unchanged against expectations for a 0.2% rise, and traders cut the odds of a September rate increase. But the measure that strips out the noisiest components accelerated to 0.4% on the month, and two Fed officials spent Thursday arguing opposite sides of the same question.
The S&P 500 and Russell 2000 Set Records in the Same Session. That Combination Deserves a Second Look
Thursday produced record closes for both the large-cap benchmark and the small-cap index, an unusual pairing given how differently the two normally respond to the same news. The mechanism connecting them was the rate path, not earnings — and inside the tape, the day was far less uniform than the index prints suggest.
Softer Inflation Moved the Front End. The 30-Year Barely Noticed
Thursday's producer price report knocked the odds of a September rate increase down hard, yet Treasury yields barely moved and the long end held above 5.2%. The repricing happened in policy expectations, not in the bond market — and Friday's data is where that gap gets tested.
Low Layoffs, No Hiring: The Split Labor Market the Fed Has to Price
Weekly jobless claims rose to 209,000 on Thursday but remain historically low, even as July payrolls fell and 103,000 jobs vanished from prior months in revision. The two series are telling opposite stories, and a Federal Reserve debating a rate hike has to reconcile them.
Asia's AI Trade Carried the Overnight Tape Into a Softer US Inflation Print
Seoul posted a second consecutive gain of more than three percent and Tokyo followed, while European shares edged higher and US futures hovered near flat. Then July producer prices landed flat and jobless claims rose, taking pressure off the rate-hike case the overnight bid had been leaning on.
Thursday's $25 Billion Bond Sale Tests Who Is Still Buying the Long End
The Treasury closes out its August refunding with a new-issue 30-year auction at 1 p.m. ET, with the long bond near a two-decade high. July's sale cleared, but on an unusually lopsided foreign bid — and July was a reopening, not a new issue.
AI server makers carry the Nasdaq to a higher close while the Dow finishes fractionally lower
Wednesday's official closing prints show a market that split inside the technology sector rather than between risk and safety, with Super Micro, Dell and Hewlett Packard Enterprise leading the S&P 500 and megacap software lagging.
The bond market barely moved on CPI, and September is still an open question
The 10-year note finished Wednesday essentially where it started, and futures pricing for the September 16 FOMC still spans roughly 37% to 45% odds of a quarter-point increase depending on which gauge you read.
A near-record crude inventory build collides with stalled Hormuz talks, and oil barely budges
US crude stocks rose 17.4 million barrels last week, the biggest weekly gain since January 2023, yet WTI slipped only 0.40% on Wednesday. The geopolitical bid is doing a lot of work.
Thursday's producer price report tests whether June's energy relief was a one-off
June's PPI fell 0.3% almost entirely because gasoline collapsed. Crude has since climbed back toward $90, and economists expect wholesale prices to turn positive again in the July data due at 8:30 a.m. ET.
Three hawkish dissents make the August 19 Fed minutes the most important document of the month
The July FOMC held at 3.50% to 3.75% by a 9-3 vote, with Hammack, Kashkari and Logan all wanting a quarter-point hike. The minutes will show how close the rest of the committee was — and how it described a labor market that has since cracked.
Stocks advance as July CPI lands on forecast and September hike odds fade
An inflation print that matched expectations down to the decimal point let Wall Street push the S&P 500 back toward its record, with chip and AI infrastructure names doing the heavy lifting.
Energy does the inflation work while core prices quietly cool
July's consumer price data showed a 3.4% headline rate propped up almost entirely by fuel and airfares, leaving the Fed's hawkish minority with a thinner case for a September increase.
AI cloud earnings deliver the growth, and the bill that comes with it
CoreWeave, Nebius and Super Micro all reported demand running far ahead of expectations, but the same results showed how much capital the buildout is consuming each quarter.
Stocks Drift Near Records as Wall Street Weighs Iran Impasse Ahead of CPI
The S&P 500 hovered near record territory Tuesday while the Dow edged higher and the Nasdaq slipped, as traders balanced stalled U.S.-Iran diplomacy against Wednesday's pivotal inflation report.
Riot Platforms Soars on $9.1 Billion, 20-Year Data Center Deal With Anthropic
The onetime bitcoin miner jumped double digits after landing a landmark 191-megawatt lease with the AI developer, cementing its pivot into large-scale data center development.