In the currency market, the dollar slipped slightly against the euro. Late Tuesday, the euro was trading at $1.3218 vs. $1.3187 on Monday.

Dollar bulls probably were feeling fortunate the buck didn’t take a worse beating, considering that the day’s numbers were dismal.

The Conference Board reported that its index of consumer confidence slid to 37.7 from an upwardly revised 38.6 in December. That was worse than economists’ expectations for a reading of 38, and is the lowest on record, dating back to 1967.

“It appears that consumers have begun the new year with the same degree of pessimism that they exhibited in the final months of 2008,” said Lynn Franco, of the Board’s Consumer Research Center. “Consumers remain quite pessimistic about the state of the economy and about their earnings.”

Separately, Standard & Poor’s Case-Shiller 20-city home price index fell 2.2% in November, with home values in all the cities falling at least 1%. For the year, prices are off 18.2%, and are down 25% from their peak in mid-2006.

“Housing wealth is falling by some $380 billion per month, or about $370 per adult per week,” wrote Ian Shepherdson, of High Frequency Economics. “No wonder people are miserable.”

Any relief in sight? No, says Joshua Shapiro, chief economist for MFR Inc., who wrote that, “It is unlikely that we are anywhere near a bottom in nationwide home prices.”

Source: Dollar Slightly Lower