Consumers Still Fighting Jitters

New York — Staging a modest rally after a major slide the month before, consumer confidence edged up 1.0% during June to a reading of 105.7 as Americans say they feel better about business conditions looking six months ahead than they do about what's happening now, The Conference Board (CB) reported. On a persistent and worrisome note, consumers feel worse about what's going on now in the economy, which the CB said could point to a slowdown during the back half of the year.

Though managing a modest rally, the June reading won back only a fraction of the steep 4.6% fall-off during May, and the widely watched bellwether of future consumer spending remains 3.7% beneath the April reading of 109.8, which marked a 13-month high in the index.

“The slight bounce-back in confidence this month was a result of the moderate improvement in consumers' expectations,” said Lynn Franco, director of the CB's Consumer Research Center. “Despite the uptick, consumers remain concerned about the short-term outlook.”

She said the part of the index measuring current conditions “lost ground for a second consecutive month, a signal that the economy is shifting into lower gear heading into the second half of this year.”

The portion of consumers claiming conditions are 'good' declined to 26.8% from 28.5% during May. Those claiming conditions are 'bad' eased to 14.9% from 15.2%.

Views of the labor market and jobs outlook were mixed. The number of consumers who think jobs are 'plentiful' dropped to 28.1% from 29.1% a month ago, while the number who think jobs are 'hard to get' decreased slightly, to 19.9% from 20.2%.