IHS Global Insight issues its forecasts on economic news of the week.

IHS Global Insight, that guru of the economic research, unveiled forecasts over the weekend on a slew of economic reports due out this week.

Keep the asprin and kazoos handy. If correct, IHS predictions signal headaches for some and party time for others, depending on your area of interest.

Good news is expected on August's new home sales and prices front on Monday and Tuesday. Single-family housing permits rose 2.5 percent in August, prompting IHS to predict that new home sales could grow by 2.5 percent as well. It's not much growth, but indicates some movement for a very hard hit industry.

Sadly, things aren't looking so hot for consumer confidence, orders for numerous durable goods or real personal income. That's a bummer, but not entirely unexpected after the markets continued their breath-catching freefall late last week. Consumer confidence wins the entire bottle of Excedrin.

Notable exerpts from the full IHS report are below.

Monday, September 26 – New Home Sales (Aug.)

IHS Global Insight: 0.305 Mil.
Consensus: 0.295 Mil.
Last Actual: 0.298 Mil (Jul.)
What to Look For

Single-family housing permits increased 2.5% in August. Based on this, we project that new home sales also grew by 2.5% in August, to a 305,000 annual rate. This market remains stuck at the bottom and the short-term outlook is for it to stay there.

Tuesday, September 27 – S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index (Jul.)

IHS Global Insight: -4.4%
Consensus: -4.4%
Last Actual: -4.5% (Jun.)
What to Look For:

The 20-city composite will be up for the fourth straight month, but will be down 4.4% year-on-year.

Implications: Housing prices appear to be stabilizing. The FHFA monthly (purchase only) house price index, for example, has risen four straight months. The reasons behind the recent stabilization are unclear, but falling mortgage rates are likely playing a key role. Our call is that the monthly seasonally adjusted Case-Shiller 20-city composite index will be up slightly (0.1%) in July. This translates into a 4.4% year-on-year drop in the not-seasonally adjusted index.

IHS Global Insight: 44.0
Consensus: 46.5
Last Actual: 44.5 (Aug.)
What to Look For

Pessimism.
Implications: We expect the Conference Board's consumer confidence index to drop from 44.5 in August to 44.0 in September.
In August, consumer confidence fell almost 25%. There's been no good news in September to brighten the mood.
(Note: the plunge in equities after the Fed's policy decision probably came after the survey period ended, so didn't do extra damage to the September confidence reading).

Wednesday, September 28 – Durable Goods Orders (Aug.)

IHS Global Insight: 0.0%
Consensus: -1.0%
Last Actual: 4.0% (Jul.)
What to Look For

Flat orders and a drop in core orders.

Thursday, September 29 – Real Gross Domestic Product (Third estimate, Q2)

IHS Global Insight: 1.3%
Consensus: 1.2%
Last Actual: 1.0% (Second estimate, Q2)
What to Look For

We expect second-quarter GDP growth to be revised up to 1.3% from the previous estimate of 1.0%.