US delivered a mixed batch of data

On the plus side jobless claims held at multi year lows of 264k week, better than consensus expectations at +272k. New home sales shot the lights out, rising 5.7% in the month to a new seven-year high. The prior month's sales pace was revised to show a 12% increase vs an initial estimate of +5.4% but then the month before that was revised down.

Against that good news durable goods orders, a key gauge of US business investment plans, slipped 2% in Aug while core capital goods shipments slipped 0.2% vs expectations for a 0.5% gain while the prior month was revised down 0.1ppt. The latter feeds directly into US GDP and following today's weaker core capital goods shipments data Q3 tracking estimates were trimmed a touch, the Atlanta Fed's "nowcast" for Q3 slipping to 1.4% annualised growth, from 1.5%.