Thursday: Unemployment Claims, Fed Chair Powell Testimony, Bank Stress Tests

Mortgage RatesThursday:
• At 8:30 AM ET, The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released.  The consensus is for 225 thousand down from 229 thousand last week.

• At 10:00 AM, Testimony, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, Semiannual Monetary Policy Report to Congress, Before the Committee on Financial Services, U.S. House of Representatives

• At 4:30 PM, The Fed will release the annual Bank Stress Tests results.

On COVID (focus on hospitalizations and deaths):

COVID Metrics
  Now Week
Ago
Goal
Percent fully Vaccinated 66.8% ≥70.0%1
Fully Vaccinated (millions) 221.9 ≥2321
New Cases per Day3 99,365 103,646 ≤5,0002
Hospitalized3🚩 24,470 24,213 ≤3,0002
Deaths per Day3 248 295 ≤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.


COVID-19 Positive Tests per DayClick on graph for larger image.

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

Average daily deaths bottomed in July 2021 at 214 per day.