Stock Market Update

The S&P 500 futures are up 24 points and are trading 0.4% above fair value, the Nasdaq 100 futures are up 136 points and are trading 0.4% above fair value, and the Dow Jones Industrial Average futures are up 130 points and are trading 0.3% above fair value.

Total retail sales increased 0.1% month-over-month in August (Briefing.com consensus -0.2%) following an upwardly revised 1.1% (from 1.0%) in July. Excluding autos, retail sales were also up 0.1% (Briefing.com consensus 0.2%) following an unrevised 0.4% increase in July.

The key takeaway from the report is that control group sales -- the component that factors into GDP -- were up a sturdy 0.3% following an upwardly revised 0.4% increase (from 0.3%) in July and 0.9% increase in June. There is no hard landing in those numbers.