Durable Goods Orders Fell 0.1% in August

The futures indicate that the stock market will open modestly higher today. Yesterday was a very good day for stocks although we lost a lot of our gains as the day wore on.

This morning, the Commerce Department reported that durable goods orders fell in August by 0.1%. This isn’t a huge drop but in July, orders soared by 4.1%.

The important number to watch in the durable goods report is orders of “non-defense capital goods.” This is a good barometer for telling us how much businesses are spending.

One of the major problems in this economy is that businesses are sitting on tons of cash but they’re not willing to spend it. The good news is that orders of non-defense capital goods increased by 1.1% in August after falling 0.2% in July.

Posted by on September 28th, 2011 at 9:49 am


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