<p><br/></p><p><font size="2">Since there is little by way of<span lang="en-us"></span></font><span lang="en-us">
<font face="Arial" size="2">economic</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2"> data releases this week, t</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2">here is</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2"></font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us">
<font face="Arial" size="2">no text for this week's economic calendar.&nbsp; Weekly jobless claims and existing home sales for December will be released on Thursday.&nbsp; The pending home sales data (which have provided a good indication of existing home sales</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2"> in recent months</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2">) point to a moderate decline in existing home sales in December, which we see down 1.0% to 4.95 million units from 5.00 million units in the prior month.&nbsp; The sharp drop in initial jobless claims in the last three weeks may be the result of the usual turn-of-the-year volatil</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2">ity</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2"> and we look for a 19,000 increase</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2"> in claims</font></span><span lang="en-us"></span><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2"> to 320,000 in the week ending January 19th.</font></span></p><p><span lang="en-us"><span lang="en-us"><font face="Arial" size="2">Please find attached the table for our weekly economic calendar.</font></span></span></p>