The economic data has been atrocious from jobs to housing and now we are getting some earnings warnings as companies are realizing that they cannot stick by the guidance offered in July.  Yet the Conference Board Consumer Confidence Index® in August somehow managed to find some consumer confidence out there.  The index had declined in July, but improved moderately in August.

The Index grew to 53.5 from 51.0 in July. The Present Situation Index decreased to 24.9 from 26.4, but it was the expectations ahead that drove the data higher: expectations Index increased to 72.5 from 67.5 last month.

We’d love to accuse the confidence survey of being too narrow, except this is based on a representative sample of 5,000 U.S. households.  The cutoff date for August’s preliminary results was August 24th.

Overall, consumers remain apprehensive about the future and for a comparison it looks like consumers are about as confident today as they were a year ago.

Those claiming business conditions are “good” fell to 8.7% from 8.8%. Those stating business conditions are “bad” also fell, to 41.9% from 43.3%.

Those saying jobs are “hard to get” rose to 45.7% from 45.1%, while those claiming jobs are “plentiful” fell to 3.8% from 4.4%.  In short, jobs stink, even for the best of the optimists.

Those anticipating an improvement in business conditions over the next six months increased to 17.0% from 15.8%, while those anticipating conditions will get worse fell to 13.4% from 15.3%.

Future employment prospects are slightly less pessimistic as those expecting more jobs in the months ahead increased to 14.6% from 14.2%; those anticipating fewer jobs fell to 19.4% from 20.9%.  Those expecting an increase in their incomes remained flat at 10.6%.

This report is far from stellar.  It is just less bad than many of the other reports.

JON C. OGG

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