Conf. Board Consumer Confidence (Jun.)

The increase in Conference Board's measure of consumer confidence to a five-and-a-half-year high of 81.4 in June, from 74.3, was quite surprising given that the usual determinants of sentiment didn't show much improvement during the survey period. We suspect that since this measure of confidence has been unusually weak recently, the rise in June probably reflects some catch-up rather than genuine improvements in the fundamentals that drive confidence.