A UNLV index covering Southern Nevada's economy was flat this month, with mixed signals coming from the pivotal local tourism and gaming industry.
UNLV's Center for Business and Economic Research on Wednesday said the Southern Nevada Index of Leading Economic Indicators, based on data from September, was up 0.01 percent from October and up 0.65 percent from November 2010.
The index is a forecast looking ahead to conditions six months from now.
Month-to-month declines in passenger traffic at McCarran International Airport (off 2.19 percent) and in gaming win (off 2.47 percent) were somewhat offfset by an overall increase in visitor volume (up 0.11 percent) and convention attendance (up 5.2 percent), the center said.
Elsewhere, mixed results were seen in residential building permit valuations, down 22.82 percent; and commercial valuations, up 8.79 percent.
Taxable sales boosted the results, improving 6.77 percent to $2.56 billion.
"Gaming revenues and construction pulled the index down, while taxable sales and other tourism-related components propped it up. Over the past six months, the index has been essentially flat as a gain in one month has been offset by a loss in another, or growth has been nonexistent (or nearly so). Nonetheless, the index shows an upward trend since late 2010, which suggests the possibility of an improving job picture in Southern Nevada," UNLV researchers reported.
The report follows issuance of the state's monthly unemployment report for October, finding unemployment locally running at 13.1 percent, down from 13.6 percent in September and 14.8 percent in October 2010.