Patrick Fearon Market Quotations

The survey for the final reading would have taken place over the past 10 days or so, when market volatility was particularly high, ... Because of that, the final reading very well could have come in below the preliminary reading. The fact it came in higher shows a certain amount of resilience in the consumer sector.

The trend in general for the last several months has been in this ballpark, with initial claims being really pretty low compared with the size of the workforce and the size of the economy. So for some time, jobless claims have been and indicator that the labor market remains healthy and March payrolls probably will remain pretty healthy as well.

With energy prices at least roughly flattening out, and with the labor market continuing to strengthen, those are probably two of the main reasons people are starting to get more optimistic.

This is consistent with our view that the housing market is likely to continue to moderate in the coming months. But ... home sales are historically pretty strong.

The labor market has been strengthening for a while, but it may be that people are finally starting to become believers in it.

It's a good sign that the consumer has some momentum going into the start of the year and that probably reflects the fact that the labor market is continuing to improve, albeit modestly. It's a positive for economic growth this year.