With no market-moving earnings reports due for release, the week ahead brings a heavy calendar of important economic data that will show more details about the strength and the progress of the economic recovery. August’s employment and the manufacturing reports are certainly expected to be the big headline for markets.
In the coming week, Chicago purchasing managers data, one of the more closely-watched regional readings on manufacturing, is due Monday morning.
ISM manufacturing, which is expected to have risen to 50.2 from 48.9 in July (a reading above 50% indicates that the manufacturing economy is expanding), is Tuesday, as are pending home sales, construction spending (expected to have fallen 0.2% in July after rising 0.3% in June), truck and auto sales (due in the afternoon), and the Fed’s minutes.
On Wednesday, ADP’s employment report (employers are expected to have cut more than 245K jobs from their payrolls), productivity and July factory orders are reported. On the factory orders – the report is expected to show an increase of 1.5% compared to June’s modest 0.4 percentage points increase.
Weekly jobless claims — due shortly before the start of trading — and ISM non-manufacturing (expected to have risen to 48 from 46.4 in July) are released Thursday, and Friday is all about August’s employment report, which is expected to show a reduction of the work force by employers to the tune of more than 220K jobs.
With the major averages now sitting more than 50% above March lows, the calls for a pullback from bears have been getting desperately louder. It will be interesting to see how this week’s economic data will influence the markets overall as we approach the six month into one of the most impressive bull markets in memory.
Here are some more highlights for the week ahead from our favorite MW reporter, Stacey Delo
