Consumer confidence retreats - Portland Business Journal:

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Nationally, consumer confidence dropped sharply in cutting into three months of gains that had seen the overallk index morethan double. The Conference Board'as Consumer Confidence Index fellby 5.5 pointsw to 49.3 in June. Statewide, Florida’s consumer confidence index for June fell three points last monthto 68, the resulr of bad economic news includingg the bankruptcy of General Motors Corp., foreclosures and a spikew in Florida’s unemployment according to a new Universityu of Florida poll.
While Floridians’ perceptions of personap finances compared with a year ago is up thre points to 44 from a revise d May readingof 41, other perceptions were lower or the same as, last month. For perceptions of U.S. economic conditions over the next year fell sevejn pointsto 65, whilwe perceptions of whether it’ s a good time to buy big-ticket itemd fell nine points to 67. Perceptions of U.S. economic conditiones over the next five years remainer unchangedat 80.
"Moving we do not expect Florida consumer confidence to decline much more over the next couple of barring some unforeseen change here in Florida or Chris McCarty, director of UF’s Survey Research Center at the Bureauj of Economic and Business Research, said in a news However, McCarty cautioned the recovery is expectedd to be long and uneven for some sectorzs of the economy. "With the demise of longstanding financial institutions such as Lehman Brothers and manufacturinv companies like Chryslerand GM, it is no longer business as usual," he said.
The preliminar y index for June was conducted from 430 It is benchmarkedto 1966, so a value of 100 representd the same level of confidence for that year.