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At 8:30 AM EDT, the Employment Cost Index for the first quarter of 2010 will be announced.  The consensus is an increase of 0.4%, which would be a decline of 0.1% compared to the last quarter of 2009.

Also at 8:30 AM EDT, the advance GDP report for the first quarter of 2010 will be announced.  The consensus is an increase of 3.4% in real GDP and an increase of 1.0% in the GDP price index.  These estimates are lower than the actuals from the previous quarter, but still indicate moderate growth.

At 9:45 AM EDT, the Chicago PMI Index for April will be announced.  The consensus index value is 60.0, which would be a slight increase from March as the economy continues to improve in the Chicago area.

At 9:55 AM EDT, Consumer Sentiment for the second half of April will be announced.  The consensus is that the index will be at 71, which would be an increase of 1.5 points from the first half of April, which had an unexpected decline.

At 3:00 PM EDT, the Farm Prices report for April will be released, giving investors and economists an indication of the direction of food prices in the coming months.

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