by Calculated Risk on 1/04/2022 08:27:00 PM

Wednesday:
• At 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 December. This report is for private payrolls only (no government). The consensus is for 413,000, down from 534,000 jobs added in November.

And on COVID (focus on hospitalizations and deaths):

COVID Metrics
	Today	Week Ago	Goal
Percent fully Vaccinated	62.2%	---	≥70.0%1
Fully Vaccinated (millions)	206.6	---	≥2321
New Cases per Day3🚩	491,652	248,571	≤5,0002
Hospitalized3🚩	85,423	64,152	≤3,0002
Deaths per Day3🚩	1,165	1,106	≤502
1 Minimum to achieve "herd immunity" (estimated between 70% and 85%). 2my goals to stop daily posts, 37-day average for Cases, Currently Hospitalized, and Deaths 🚩 Increasing 7-day average week-over-week for Cases, Hospitalized, and Deaths ✅ Goal met.

Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the daily (columns) and 7-day average (line) of positive tests reported.

New cases are at record levels.  It appears likely hospitalizations will exceed the previous 7-day average record of 124,031 a year ago.

Fortunately, deaths are still well below the previous 7-day average record of 3,421 in January 2021.