by Calculated Risk on 5/01/2021 08:11:00 AM

The key report scheduled for this week is the April employment report.

Other key reports include April vehicle sales, and the March trade balance.

For manufacturing, the April ISM manufacturing index will be released.

----- Monday, May 3rd -----
10:00 AM: ISM Manufacturing Index for April. The consensus is for the ISM to be at 65.0, up from 64.7 in March.

10:00 AM: Construction Spending for March. The consensus is for a 2.0% increase in construction spending.

All day: Light vehicle sales for April. The expectation is for light vehicle sales to be 17.9 million SAAR in April, unchanged from 17.85 million in March (Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate).

This graph shows light vehicle sales since the BEA started keeping data in 1967. The dashed line is the sales rate for the previous month.

2:00 PM: Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey on Bank Lending Practices for April.

2:20 PM, Speech, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, Community Development, At the National Community Reinvestment Coalition’s 2021 Just Economy Conference (via livestream)

----- Tuesday, May 4th -----
8:00 AM ET: Corelogic House Price index for March.

8:30 AM: Trade Balance report for March from the Census Bureau.

This graph shows the U.S. trade deficit, with and without petroleum, through the most recent report. The blue line is the total deficit, and the black line is the petroleum deficit, and the red line is the trade deficit ex-petroleum products.

The consensus is the trade deficit to be $74.0 billion.  The U.S. trade deficit was at $71.1 Billion in February.

----- Wednesday, May 5th -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

8:15 AM: The ADP Employment Report for April. This report is for private payrolls only (no government). The consensus is for 830,000 payroll jobs added in April, up from 517,000 added in March.

10:00 AM: the ISM Services Index for April.   The consensus is for a reading of 64.3, up from 63.7.

----- Thursday, May 6th -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released.  The consensus is for a decrease to 525 thousand from 553 thousand last week.

----- Friday, May 7th -----
8:30 AM: Employment Report for April.   The consensus is for 978,000 jobs added, and for the unemployment rate to decrease to 5.7%.

There were 916,000 jobs added in March, and the unemployment rate was at 6.0%.

This graph shows the job losses from the start of the employment recession, in percentage terms.

The current employment recession was by far the worst recession since WWII in percentage terms, and is now slightly better than the worst of the "Great Recession".