The ABC News Consumer Comfort Index was described by its sponsor as per the title. Here are some excerpts from today's weekly update:
With five days ’til Halloween and seven before the election, consumer confidence is looking like a horror show for the party in power.
The ABC News Consumer Comfort Index stands at -47 on its scale from +100 to -100, 7 points from its low in nearly 25 years of weekly polls. It’s been this bad just twice in the week before an election: in 2008 and 1992, both years the Republicans were turfed out of the White House.
Now it looks like the incumbent Democrats’ turn to suffer. As in the past, economic discontent is fueling broad dissatisfaction with the status quo, and it’s aimed particularly at the party calling the shots in Washington.
Meanwhile, the one bit of consumer polling I have seen that is an upside change is Gallup's daily polling of hiring-not hiring, which has broken out to what I believe is a multi-month high of +15. Let us see if that can be sustained or is a blip. (Other parameters such as discretionary spending were depressed as usual in the same poll, however.)
In other news, Bill Gross has turned bearish on U. S. bonds. Probably time to buy again.
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