The latest Vail Retail Occupancy report has been posted to the Data Center.

via DestiMetrics:

2017 has kicked off with a combination of epic snow across western destinations, and epic economic performance across most financial markets.  Though the national political discourse is heated, Wall Street and employers are on-board with the current state of the economy, while consumers are a little more cautious about the long-run.  Meanwhile, skiers & riders are on-board with the current state of on-mountain conditions, which we’ll talk about in this month’s Briefing, coming out by the 15th. In the meantime, here’s a quick look at the three primary economic indicators for January.

Dow Jones Industrial Average:  The Dow added a slight 101.5 points, or 0.51 percent, in January, closing at 19,864.1 points and setting a third consecutive monthly record.  Wall St is anticipating a possible easing of regulation and oversight, which will continue to drive markets upward if the expectation is sustained. This was the 9th monthly gain of in the past twelve months.

Consumer Confidence Index: Consumer Confidence decreased slightly in January, dropping from December’s 15-year high of 113.3 to 111.8 points.  While consumers feel good about current conditions, they are expressing concern about the long-term outlook for business, employment, and especially income.  Confidence is currently 14.1 percent higher than in January 2016.

Unemployment / Jobs:  Employers added 227,000 new jobs in January, considerably more than the 180,000 expected, and the national unemployment rate increased slightly to 4.8 percent from 4.7 percent in December.  However, wages, which had shown some recovery in recent months, returned to their pattern of low growth, increasing just 2.5 percent compared to January 2016, below expectations.