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The Conference Board's Composite Index of Leading Economic Indicators rebounded in March, rising 1.3% m/m (+7.9% y/y)...
Chicago Fed National Activity Index Increases in March
The Chicago Fed's National Activity Index increased to 1.71 during March...
Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Activity Strengthens in April
The Kansas City Fed reported that its manufacturing sector business activity index rose to a record 31 in April...
U.S. Initial Jobless Claims Fall Again to a New Pandemic-Period Low
Initial claims for unemployment insurance decreased again in the week ending April 17, reaching 547,000...
U.K. CBI Optimism Speaks Volumes
The U.K. CBI survey saw its order component backtrack in April...
Viewpoints
Commentaries are the opinions of the author and do not reflect the views of Haver Analytics.
by Tom Moeller April 2, 2020
Factory orders fell slightly (+0.1% y/y) during February following a 0.5% January decline. The Action Economics Forecast Survey expected a 0.2% gain. Durable goods orders jumped 1.2% (-0.0% y/y) following a 0.1% improvement. Machinery orders eased 0.6% (-2.6% y/y) but electrical machinery orders jumped 1.3% (3.2% y/y). Orders for computers & electronic products fell 0.7% (-0.2% y/y). Orders for nondurable products, which equal shipments, declined 1.2% (+0.3% y/y) as the value of petroleum refinery shipments fell 4.1% (-2.8% y/y), down sharply for the second straight month due to lower prices. Basic chemical shipments fell 0.4% (+1.8% y/y) but apparel shipments declined 2.4% (-0.9% y/y).
Shipments of durable goods rose 0.9% (-2.4% y/y) as transportation shipments increased 2.9% (-5.2% y/y). Shipments outside of the transportation sector fell 0.8% (-0.2% y/y). Machinery shipments were off 1.3% (-3.4% y/y) while electrical equipment & appliance shipments improved 1.6% (2.7% y/y). Transportation sector shipments strengthened 2.9% (-5.2% y/y) as nondefense aircraft shipments rebounded 17.5%. They remained down by one third y/y. Shipments of computers & electronic products rose 0.3% (-0.6% y/y).
Unfilled orders for manufactured products improved 0.1% (-1.7% y/y) after holding steady for two consecutive months. Transportation sector backlogs rose 0.2% (-2.3% y/y). Excluding transportation, unfilled orders eased 0.2% (-0.6% y/y). Machinery backlogs rose 0.1% (-3.5% y/y) while computer & electronic equipment order backlogs fell 0.1% (+0.6% y/y). Electronic equipment & appliance order backlogs rose 0.2% (6.7% y/y).
Factory sector inventories declined 0.4% (+1.6% y/y). Transportation equipment inventories rose 0.4% (13.0% y/y) but auto inventories fell 2.8% (+6.9% y/y). Excluding the transportation sector, inventories fell 0.6% (-1.1% y/y). Electrical equipment inventories were off 0.2% (+1.1% y/y) while computer & electronic product inventories slipped 0.8% (+0.2% y/y). Nondurable product inventories fell 0.9% (-1.5% y/y) as the value of petroleum refinery stockpiles dropped 6.1% (-4.8% y/y). Apparel inventories eased 0.6% (-3.3% y/y) and food product inventories rose slightly (1.0% y/y).
The factory sector figures are available in Haver's USECON database. The expectation figure is in the AS1REPNA database.
Factory Sector (% chg) - NAICS Classification | Feb | Jan | Dec | Feb Y/Y | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
New Orders | -0.0 | -0.5 | 1.9 | 0.1 | -0.5 | 7.3 | 5.7 |
Shipments | -0.2 | -0.6 | 0.5 | -1.1 | 0.7 | 6.9 | 5.0 |
Unfilled Orders | 0.1 | 0.0 | 0.0 | -1.7 | -2.1 | 3.9 | 1.9 |
Inventories | -0.4 | -0.3 | 0.4 | 1.6 | 3.1 | 3.5 | 4.5 |