Our Internal Economic Distress Index - Updated 11/10/2009

This index was created to give individuals a measurement of the economic pressures that face the US consumer. Similar to the 'Misery Index' of the 1970's, the EDI is a weighted index that considers unemployment, consumer price inflation, purchasing power parity of the US Dollar, and the burden of consumer credit. Wherever feasible, we have used reliable alternate data to eliminate hedonic adjustments to the greatest extent possible. For the sake of simplicity, the visual chart will be updated each quarter to avoid clutter, but the index itself will be calculated and updated on a monthly basis. The formulation is as follows:

SA-EDI= 0.48182 * (CPI-(in-house)^0.15*USDX(trade-weighted)^-0.15*U-6 Unemployment Rate^0.4*Cons. Credit Outstanding^0.3)

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November EDI: 172.392