Archive for the ‘Insight’ tag
Bold, Creative, Aggressive Policy Action Needed for GSEs to Survive
Brian Bethune, chief U.S. financial economist at Global Insight,
said “Bold, creative, aggressive policy action is needed
for the GSEs to survive in their current capacity as private entities,
and it is needed now.”
He called the capitalization-crisis of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac
a “potentially dangerous turn of events in the current U.S. business
cycle” that must be “defused swiftly and effectively, because failure to
do so would risk a further meltdown of the housing and
mortgage markets of proportions not seen since the depression era.”
Expect Pending Home Sales to Keep Falling, Economists Say
The 4.7% decline in U.S. pending home sales in May shows that the
previous month’s gain was not a true sign of
stabilization, economists said after a release the National
Association of Realtors on Tuesday.
Patrick Newport, U.S. economist at Global Insight, called the
report “disappointing,” noting that a lot of forces such as tight credit
and rising interest rates in May were at work to bring down each of the
four regions’ sales. He said previous data suggested signs of
stabilization, but this release indicates the housing market has yet to
hit a bottom.
FOMC to Hold Interest Rates at 2.00%, Markets to Focus on Statement
Not a single contrarian voice exists among the 101 economists surveyed
by Bloomberg for Wednesday’s U.S. rate announcement from the Federal Open
Market Committee. All agree that the Fed will hold rates at 2.00%
, which means the focus will turn towards the accompanying
statement to look for insight as to whether the Fed is thinking of hiking
rates later this year, economists say.