Consumer Confidence Climbs; Home Prices Record Plunge; Troubled Banks on the Rise; Oil Falls 7%; Slim’s Bank Buys Citi Stock; D.R. Horton Shares Vault

Consumer Confidence at All-Time Low; Home Prices Continue Collapse; OPEC Still Not Satisfied; Whirlpool Circles the Drain; Optimistic Wall Street; Banks Balk on Buyout; Stop the Presses?

The US consumer confidence index plunged to an all-time low of 38 in October, down sharply from 61.4 in September. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg anticipated a reading of 52.

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The dimming outlook signals consumer spending, which accounts for more than two-thirds of the economy, will deteriorate further, deepening the U.S. slump.

“The economy feels like it is contracting at a rapid pace,” Lewis Alexander, chief economist at Citigroup Global Markets Inc. in New York, said in a Bloomberg Television interview. “It’s clear that consumers have really been affected by the volatility we’ve seen in the last six weeks.”

The report underscores voter discontent with the country’s direction heading into the Nov. 4 presidential election. A majority of voters think Illinois Senator Barack…

In the currency market, the dollar firmed against the euro. Late Tuesday, the euro was trading at $1.5696 vs. $1.5763 on Friday.

The U.S. trade deficit unexpectedly grew in February, as surging imports overwhelmed a rush of record high exports. A widening trade gap is the opposite of what most analysts anticipated, as a weak dollar and slackening demand were supposed to have made trade the one bright spot in what is now almost certainly a recession.