Consumer sentiment improved slightly in June, with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index ticking up to 91.2 as relief from cheaper oil tempered but did not overcome growing unease about the job market.
The Conference Board's index rose 0.6 points to 91.2, though it fell short of economist forecasts and labor market concerns deepened
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Consumer sentiment improved slightly in June, with the Conference Board's Consumer Confidence Index ticking up to 91.2 as relief from cheaper oil tempered but did not overcome growing unease about the job market.
The reading, a gain of 0.6 points over May's downwardly revised 90.6, fell short of forecasts. Economists had expected a reading of 94.2, according to The Wall Street Journal. The median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of economists was 94.4.
"Consumer confidence inched up in June as falling oil prices in recent weeks provided some relief to consumer inflation fears," Dana M. Peterson, chief economist at The Conference Board, said in a statement. Consumers' write-in responses on factors affecting the economy skewed toward pessimism, though references to prices, oil and gas, and geopolitical conflict eased in frequency, the Conference Board said.
Among the report's subindices, the Present Situation Index dropped 3.0 points to 116.4, reflecting softer views of current business and employment conditions. Offsetting that decline, the Expectations Index climbed 3.0 points to 74.4, with brighter outlooks for household incomes and business conditions six months out providing the lift.
Labor market perceptions were the sharpest source of concern. A 5½-year high share of survey respondents — 22.5% — reported difficulty finding work, according to the Conference Board. The resulting spread between those who described jobs as plentiful and those who found them scarce compressed by 2.6 percentage points, leaving the so-called labor market differential at just 2.4%.
On the inflation front, both average and median price-increase expectations for the coming year moved lower, yet roughly 61.5% of those surveyed said they expect interest rates to be higher a year from now, the Conference Board said. The survey period covered June 1–23, which included an extension of the U.S.-Iran ceasefire agreement that the Conference Board said likely influenced expectations for stock prices.
The June report follows a difficult stretch for consumer sentiment. The Conference Board's index dipped in May as the inflationary fallout from the Middle East war weighed on Americans, with pump prices nationally surging to roughly $4.49 per gallon and annual inflation reaching 3.8% in April, its fastest pace in three years. The University of Michigan's rival sentiment gauge bounced off May's all-time low of 44.8, yet June's reading still ranked as the second worst in the survey's history stretching back to the 1970s.
Big-ticket purchase plans improved modestly in June. Buying intentions for autos continued rising on a six-month average basis, and homebuying expectations also climbed, the Conference Board said.
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