Looking Back on the week ended 08/16/2011

• 1) U.S. second-quarter GDP was revised down to a 1.0% annualized growth rate from the previously estimated 1.3%, though near the 1.15% expected by markets.
• 2) U.S. new home sales fell 0.7% to an annualized 298,000 units in July, after June sales were revised down to 300,000 units from the previously reported 312,000 units. The months' supply of unsold homes held at 6.6 months in July. The median sales price fell to $222,000 in July from $236,000 in June.
• 3)  U.S. durable orders surged 4.0% month-over-month in July, erasing their 1.3% drop in June. Excluding transportation orders, new orders were up 0.7%.
• 4)  The Federal Housing Finance Agency's (FHFA) home price index rose 0.9% in June on a seasonally adjusted purchase-only basis, and is up for the third straight month. The index is down 5.9% year-over-year and down 18.8% from its April 2007 peak.
• 5)   Initial jobless claims rose 5,000 to 417,000 in the week ended August 20, after the prior week was revised to 412,000 from 408,000, remaining above the 400,000 threshold, indicating a weak job market. Continuing claims fell 80,000 to 3.641 million in the week ended August 13, pushing the adjusted insured unemployment rate to 2.9% from 3.0% the week before.
• 6)    The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan's U.S. consumer sentiment index for August fell to 55.7 from 63.7 in July, though higher than the preliminary 54.9 August reading.
• 7)     Oil prices rose to $85.40/barrel on Friday afternoon from the prior week's $81/barrel.