Stocks enter the final hour about even on little news. Friday’s economic calendar is a busy one with the ISM Services Index and official Employment Report amongst other releases.
Productivity was revised down to –1.8% in the 2nd quarter, the original figure was -.9%. Unit labor costs were revised up from +.2% to +1.1%. This suggests that labor based cost control may have reached its limit. While 1-month does not make a trend if this continues it will have a negative impact on profits going forward and also market valuations.
Light vehicle sales fell .5% in August to 11.47 million units annualized as per Autodata Corp. Sales are down 18.9% from a year ago, the peak cash for clunkers month. Which demonstrates that like housing, tax credits can be used to induce people to buy things. This pulls demand forward and results in substantial declines after the fact.
Its not all bad news, the Pending Home Sales Index increased 5.2% in July so we may get a small bounce off the bottom in the sales figures next month, as per the NAR. While Personal bankruptcy fillings slipped 8% in August as per the American Bankruptcy Institute to 127,028. That said personal bankruptcies are on track to break 1.6 million this year.
Hi and welcome to The Profit Motive, I’m your host Caleb Lawrence. Once upon a time in America the media acted as the watchdog of the corporations and the state. In the modern era it’s all about ratings and profits, opinion has been substituted for news and frequently is presented as fact. 
