by Calculated Risk on 7/02/2012 08:38:00 PM

Special Note: Stephen Campbell, frequent commenter under the name Nova, and author of "American Apocalypse" has passed away. Very sad news. Nova wrote parts of American Apocalypse several years ago in the comments of CR, and many of us followed along. He will be greatly missed.

The key report on Tuesday will be auto sales. Remember sales were depressed last year because of the tsunami in Japan, and the automakers report a comparison to the same month in the previous year. Some automakers were hit harder than others, so what will matter is the Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate (SAAR).

• All day: Light vehicle sales for June. Light vehicle sales are expected to increase to 13.9 million SAAR from 13.8 million in May.

• At 10:00 AM ET, the Manufacturers' Shipments, Inventories and Orders (Factory Orders) for May will be released. The consensus is for a 0.1% increase in orders.

• Also at 10:00 AM, the Trulia Price & Rent Monitors for June will be released. This is the new index from Trulia that uses asking prices adjusted both for the mix of homes listed for sale and for seasonal factors.

• Early: Reis is expected to released their Q2 Office Vacancy report.

The Asian markets are mostly green tonight. The Nikkei is up 0.4%, and the Shanghai Composite is up slightly.

From CNBC: Pre-Market Data and Bloomberg futures: the S&P 500 and Dow futures are down slightly.


Oil: WTI futures are down to $83.43 (this is down from $109.77 in February, but up last week) and Brent is at $97.21 per barrel. According to a formula from Professor Hamilton, the price of Brent would suggest gasoline at $3.27 per gallon (the current national average price is $3.35, so even with the increase in Brent, gasoline prices will probably fall further).

Note: SIFMA recommends US markets close at 2:00 PM ET in advance of the Independence Day Holiday on July 4th.