Global| Mar 02 2006U.S. Construction Increase Light
by:Tom Moeller
|in:Economy in Brief
Summary
Warm temperatures in January did little for the value of construction put in place which increased just 0.2%. Consensus expectations had been for a 1.1% gain but the firm 1.0% advance in December was unrevised. Residential building [...]
Warm temperatures in January did little for the value of construction put in place which increased just 0.2%. Consensus expectations had been for a 1.1% gain but the firm 1.0% advance in December was unrevised.
Residential building rose only 0.1 following a downwardly revised 0.9% December increase. New single family building inched up just 0.1% (13.2% y/y) while the value of improvements rose 0.2% (-10.6% y/y). The value of new multi-family residential construction fell 0.5% (+12.4% y/y).
Nonresidential building added 0.5% to a downwardly revised 1.1% December increase. Office construction slipped 0.2% (+8.9% y/y) and commercial building rose 0.4% (+9.5% y/y). These y/y gains pale when compared to multi-retail commercial which rose 7.9% in January (40.0% y/y).
Public construction spending rose 0.2% following an upwardly revised 1.3% December increase. Construction activity on highways & streets, nearly one third of the value of public construction spending, recovered the prior month's decline and rose 0.9% (12.7% y/y).
These more detailed categories represent the Census Bureau’s reclassification of construction activity into end-use groups. Finer detail is available for many of the categories; for instance, commercial construction is shown for Automotive sales and parking facilities, drugstores, building supply stores, and both commercial warehouses and mini-storage facilities. Note that start dates vary for some seasonally adjusted line items in 2000 and 2002 and that constant-dollar data are no longer computed.
| Construction Put-in-place | Jan | Dec | Y/Y | 2005 | 2004 | 2003 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total | 0.2% | 1.0% | 7.4% | 9.1% | 10.9% | 5.4% |
| Private | 0.2% | 0.9% | 6.3% | 9.6% | 13.6% | 6.3% |
| Residential | 0.1% | 0.9% | 6.5% | 11.4% | 18.2% | 12.9% |
| Nonresidential | 0.5% | 1.1% | 5.6% | 5.2% | 3.9% | -5.4% |
| Public | 0.2% | 1.3% | 11.3% | 7.6% | 2.5% | 2.7% |
Tom Moeller
AuthorMore in Author Profile »Prior to joining Haver Analytics in 2000, Mr. Moeller worked as the Economist at Chancellor Capital Management from 1985 to 1999. There, he developed comprehensive economic forecasts and interpreted economic data for equity and fixed income portfolio managers. Also at Chancellor, Mr. Moeller worked as an equity analyst and was responsible for researching and rating companies in the economically sensitive automobile and housing industries for investment in Chancellor’s equity portfolio. Prior to joining Chancellor, Mr. Moeller was an Economist at Citibank from 1979 to 1984. He also analyzed pricing behavior in the metals industry for the Council on Wage and Price Stability in Washington, D.C. In 1999, Mr. Moeller received the award for most accurate forecast from the Forecasters' Club of New York. From 1990 to 1992 he was President of the New York Association for Business Economists. Mr. Moeller earned an M.B.A. in Finance from Fordham University, where he graduated in 1987. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Economics from George Washington University.
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