New home buyers via the new home credit. Inventories drop one month to 7.5 months. Not bad at all. Highest numbers since Sept. of 2008.
Most of these sales are due to the $8000 tax credit. Also sales of houses tend to occur in the late spring to mid summer, there after sales tend to slow. Come november 30th they are eliminating the tax credit, however I believe they are going to keep it going, extend it and also increase it to $10000 or even $12000 to keep sales moving into the end of 2009.
440k sales on an annualized rate WITH the 8k first time home buyer tax credit - from an annualized sales rate of 2.1 million in 2007!!! All while loans are starting to get tighter again, unemployment is skyrocketing, wages are falling, government deficit spending is exploding, banks are starting to implode and the government gravy train of tax credits is expiring and after the biggest stock market rally (bubble-licious) in the history of the markets! Green Shoots!
And if you've been SHORTING this market over the last couple of months based on the so-called economic "fundamentals" you've been totally ripped a new A-hole and are filing for Bankruptcy. Traders do NOT care about anything but PRICE, because they are well aware that the equity market is LIQUIDITY driven. Moreover, only $27 billion has come back into US mutual funds ( as of July ). Contrast this with the -$160 Billion that came out up until February.
I agree the in/outflows are important, but I think the inflows will be more tempered this time around as everyone is still hungover from the euphoria in a few years back.
None of what you said matters to the market right now. Goldman and the Fed want the market up, so they are walking it up. Case closed.
That is the thing Landis82 bylosellhi does not trade. He searches financial sites for doom and gloom articles so he can post them on ET