Recent increases in US long-term rates surprisingly little impacted by inflation expectations

Even with strong capex, US nonfinancial corporations are generating more cash than they are investing

Investor sentiment worldwide is positive, especially in AI-led Asia

Sectoral shift in US job openings

Meteoric rise in AI-related semiconductor exports fueling South Korea's export boom

Regional Fed surveys showing further manufacturing acceleration in August

Sharp drop in China demand for oil helping to limit impact of Middle East conflict on the price

Decades high real price of copper posing physical challenge to investment boom

Rising US long-term real yields point to strong demand for investment funding

US retail sales accelerate even as consumers remain gloomy

Retail gasoline price still well above pre-conflict level and now rising again

PMIs showing widespread revival of global economy

Crude oil price has returned to pre-conflict level but traffic through Hormuz still subpar

Surging orders for computers and electronics propelling durable goods orders

Next year's inflation forecasts are on the rise and above target

Disrupted global supply chains placing upward pressure on US goods prices

Construction of data centers has overtaken transportation construction in US

Elevated energy prices putting intense upward pressure on input prices around the globe

US is big leader in global surge in private AI investment

Larger-than-usual income tax refunds this year are supporting consumer spending

Sharply rising share of AI-related jobs

Inflationary impact of surge in oil prices larger in Europe than in the US

Futures market thinks the price of oil will recede significantly over the next six months

Recent pickup in US defense orders could help support overall growth ahead

Cost of transporting crude oil has soared to series high

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Michael J. Moran

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Nonfarm payroll employment rose 29K in September, notably below the expected increase of 85K. Moreover, results in the prior two months were revised lower by 60K, with adjustments in July and August contributing about equally. The new figures left the average monthly increase so far this year at 68K, an improvement from the average of 10K in 2025 but light relative to historical norms.

By industry, construction and manufacturing performed reasonably well with gains of 11K and 9K, respectively. These sectors were decidedly weak last year, but they have posted gains in most months this year (average advances of 10K and 8K year-to-date). Retail trade is another area that is improving this year after a poor performance in 2025. Retailers added 6K jobs in September, but combined results in the prior two months were revised lower by 14K (still up year-to-date with an average monthly gain of 7K). The business service sector also is on a recovery track this year, but September brought a notable setback: employment fell by 9K and results in July and August were revised lower by 36K (still up year-to-date, 12K on average).

Three areas were weak last year and remain on soft paths so far this year. The information sector lost an average of 4K jobs per month last year and is cutting at an average pace of 11K so far this year. This is a broad area, encompassing firms involved in movie production, broadcasting, publishing, libraries, and tech-related areas; all have been soft. The financial service industry did little hiring last year (fewer than 1K jobs per month), and it has cut at an average rate of 12K per month so far this year. Government employment fell at an average rate of 15K last year and 2K so far this year. The federal government has led this retreat in employment, but state governments trimmed payrolls last year and have continued to do so this year. Local governments have made only modest additions to payrolls since mid-2025.

The unemployment rate reportedly rose 0.1 percentage point to 4.2%, but if calculated with more precision, the change was less than 0.1 percentage point (4.176% vs. 4.141%). In addition, it was a benigh increase in joblessness in that the labor force expanded solidly (485K), but employment as measured by the household survey rose by a slightly smaller amount (406K). The broad unemployment rate (the U-6 measure) fell 0.1 percentage point to 7.6%. The number of individuals working part-time involuntarily rose in September, but this increase was offset by a drop in the number of individuals marginally attached to the labor force. (Marginally attached individuals are defined as those that would like a job and have looked in the past 12 months but have not searched in the past four weeks.)

Average hourly earnings rose 0.1% in September, lighter than the expected increase of 0.3% and a reading in the low end of the recent range. The year-over-year change of 3.0% continued a downward trend that began in 2022 (chart, below left). Many observers have noted that wage growth is no longer keeping pace with inflation. This is true, although the differential has not been large and it followed gains in purchasing power by working individuals in the prior few years (wages did trail inflation during the burst in 2021-22). The relationship between wage growth and inflation waxes and wanes over time; from a long-term perspective, wage growth has bested inflation more often than not. 


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- Disappointing change in nonfarm payrolls
- Marginal increase in unemployment
- Modest increase in average hourly earnings


September Employment Report

Andrew Cates

**One Direction**
The October Blue Chip Financial Forecasts survey marks a shift in tone more than in central expectation. Growth is still holding up and recession is not what the panel expects, though the probabilities attached to Europe remain well above those for the United States. What has changed is the inflation side of the balance. A large majority of panelists now regard inflation as the greater risk (compared with growth), in the US and beyond it, and twelve-month interest-rate paths have been revised up accordingly. Japan has become a more prominent part of the global tightening story, with its policy rate now expected to move furthest over the coming year. The Bank of England is expected to move least. But the direction of travel is the same everywhere, and that is itself a change from the survey compared with a few months ago.

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**Hiring for the Machine**
Demand for artificial-intelligence skills has spread well beyond the economies most closely associated with the technology. Canada stands out, with the share of job postings mentioning AI now roughly double the UK’s and well above the American figure. That comparison requires care. Because these are shares of total vacancies, the gap may reflect faster growth in non-AI postings in the United States, rather than stronger absolute demand for AI skills in Canada. Differences in the composition of vacancies also matter, while postings measure hiring intentions rather than actual employment. Even so, the prevalence of AI-related vacancies outside the United States suggests that the technology’s diffusion is not confined to the economies attracting the most investment.

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**A Favourable Combination**
World industrial production has been accelerating through the first half of this year while core consumer price inflation across the G7 has continued to drift lower. A demand-led expansion would not usually produce that combination; it would push both series the same way. Starting positions matter here. Output is accelerating from a weak base, so the growth rates flatter the recovery in levels, and inflation has been falling from a rate that sat well above most central bank targets. Nor are the two measures strictly comparable. Industrial production captures a narrow and unusually cyclical slice of activity, while core inflation excludes the energy costs that have done most to unsettle markets this year. The timing is also ambiguous, since prices respond to activity with a lag long enough that the recent divergence may yet close. Still, a more natural reading could be that effective supply has been improving, whether through fuller use of existing capacity or early returns on the investment now under way.

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**The Capex Cycle Has Turned**
Real capital goods orders across the United States, Germany and Japan have now been rising for well over a year, and annual growth is close to its strongest since the post-pandemic rebound. Composition matters as much as the growth rate. Data centres and the electrical equipment that serves them account for part of it, but so do defence programmes, grid investment and the reshoring of supply chains, which are being driven by security considerations and are correspondingly insensitive to the cost of capital. In volume terms, orders remain below their 2021 levels, which suggests a cycle that is established but not yet mature. Upswings of this kind have historically run for several years once they take hold.

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**Pay Without Pressure**
Pay growth has roughly halved since 2023 in the United States, the euro area and the United Kingdom, three labour markets with very different bargaining structures and degrees of centralisation. That common path is striking, and it has been achieved without a sharp rise in unemployment. The temptation is to credit restrictive monetary policy, but the absence of any material loosening in employment argues against it. A demand-restraint channel operating with this much force should have left a clearer mark on jobs. The simpler explanation is that pay was catching up with an inflation shock and has fallen back as that shock has faded, helped by a recovery in labour supply and by an adjustment that has run through vacancies rather than through headcount. Whatever the cause, the consequence is the same. Where firms are producing more without employing proportionately more people, unit labour costs fall, margins hold and the inflationary consequences of resilient demand are muted. That is the condition on which the current configuration rests, and it is the first thing that would change were capacity to become binding.

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**The Price of Power**
Industrial electricity prices in the Middle Atlantic region in the United States, where data centre capacity is most heavily concentrated, have pulled steadily further away from those in Texas over the past two years. A regional premium is not evidence of a national energy shortage, and such differences have always existed. What it does perhaps indicate is where the physical limits bite first. Digital capital can be installed in months; generating plant, transmission lines and grid connections cannot, and the permitting queues are long. Should the cost of power in the places where the boom is being built keep rising faster than elsewhere, the productivity gains will be absorbed by the energy bill rather than showing up in lower costs or wider margins. The favourable part of this expansion is real enough. But it is a phase, and the grid is where its limits will be tested first.

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Long-dated US Treasury yields climbed again this week to levels last seen before the financial crisis. Crude oil prices in the meantime eased into the quarter-end as Middle Eastern exports recovered, though Brent will still likely close September higher than it began, and equity markets have absorbed the move in bonds without much difficulty. Forecasters have followed these market moves rather than resisted them. The latest Blue Chip Financial Forecasts survey suggest that policy rates are now expected to be higher in twelve months' time in every major economy, with Japan moving furthest and the United Kingdom least (chart 1). The difficulty is that this repricing is taking place against a world economy that is arguably performing better than a tightening cycle would ordinarily permit. Demand for artificial-intelligence skills is rising in labour markets well beyond the United States (chart 2), world industrial output has accelerated even as core inflation across the G7 has fallen (chart 3), and capital goods orders across the G3 have turned decisively higher (chart 4). Wage growth has slowed in three very different labour markets of late without the increase in unemployment that earlier disinflations demanded (chart 5). Such a combination is rare, and it rests on conditions that may not hold. The constraint that eventually binds could be more physical than monetary, and it is already apparent in the cost of electricity in the regions where the data centres are being built (chart 6).

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Charts of the Week: A Benign Phase

Winnie Tapasanun

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The ISM U.S. manufacturing PMI unexpectedly dipped to 54.5 in September from 54.6 in August and 55.6 in July, according to data from the Institute for Supply Management. The September reading, above the 50 expansion-contraction threshold, indicated the U.S. manufacturing sector expanded for the ninth consecutive month, albeit at a marginally slower pace. A reading of 55.0 for September had been expected in the Action Economics Forecast Survey. The latest manufacturing PMI, while above a contractionary 48.9 in September 2025 and a low of 47.0 in October 2024, remained below a peak of 63.8 in March 2021.

The production index declined to 56.7 in September from 58.3 in August, indicating production expanded for the 11th straight month but at the slowest rate since June. The index was above a low of 44.8 in April 2025 but below a peak of 66.5 in March 2021. In September, 25.4% (NSA) of respondents reported higher production while 11.9% reported lower production. The new orders index rebounded to 55.3 in September from 53.7 in August (the lowest reading since March), signaling new orders grew for the ninth consecutive month following four successive months of contraction. The index remained well above a low of 41.8 in January 2023 but below a high of 67.0 in May 2021. In September, 23.4% (NSA) of respondents reported higher new orders while 15.5% reported declines. The inventories index fell further to 48.6 in September—the first contraction since May and the lowest level since March—from 50.6 in August, returning to the broader contractionary trend in place since May 2025. The index was below a high of 52.7 in March 2025 but above a low of 43.8 in October 2024. Meanwhile, the supplier deliveries index edged down to 59.0 in September from 59.3 in August, indicating slowing delivery performance for the 10th straight month after faster deliveries in November 2025. In September, 21.4% (NSA) of respondents reported slower delivery speeds while 3.4% reported faster speeds.

On the labor front, the employment index rebounded to 52.7 in September from 51.2 in August, showing employment expanded for the third consecutive month, at a stronger pace, following 33 months of contraction. The index was above a low of 44.1 in November 2025 but below a high of 56.5 in March 2022. In September, 15.3% (NSA) of respondents reported higher employment while 14.5% reported lower hiring.

On the pricing front, the prices paid index advanced to 77.9 (NSA) in September from 71.1 in August and 71.1 in July, indicating raw materials prices rose for 24 months running and at the fastest rising pace since May. The index remained well above a low of 39.4 in December 2022 but below a high of 87.1 in March 2022 and a peak of 92.1 in June 2021. In September, 58.6% (NSA) of respondents reported higher prices while only 2.8% reported price declines.

In other ISM series not included in the composite index, the new export orders index decreased to 50.9 in September from 53.2 in August, indicating new export orders grew for the fourth time in five months, albeit at the lowest level since June’s contractionary 48.5. The index was up from a low of 40.1 in May 2025 but down from a peak of 57.1 in February 2022. The imports index slipped to 51.0 in September from 52.5 in August, suggesting imports expanded for the eighth successive month but at the weakest rate since April. The index was above a low of 39.9 in May 2025 but below a peak of 61.0 in June 2021. The order backlog index climbed to 56.4 (NSA) in September from 51.8 in August, showing backlog levels grew for the ninth straight month and at the fastest pace since February’s high of 56.6. The index was well above a low of 37.5 in May 2023 but below a peak of 70.6 in May 2021.

The ISM figures are based on responses from over 400 purchasing and supply executives from 18 industries, which are weighted according to each industry’s contribution to GDP. These data are diffusion indexes where a reading above 50 indicates expansion; below 50 indicates contraction. The ISM Manufacturing PMI is a composite index based on the diffusion indexes of five of the indexes (seasonally adjusted) with equal weights: New Orders, Production, Employment, Supplier Deliveries, and Inventories. The figures from the Institute for Supply Management can be found in Haver’s **USECON** database; further detail is found in the **SURVEYS** database. The expectations number is available in Haver’s **AS1REPNA** database.

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- ISM Mfg. PMI down slightly to 54.5 in Sept.; ninth straight month of expansion.
- Production (56.7) lowest since June; still expanding for the 11th consecutive mth.
- New orders (55.3) growing at a faster pace; ninth successive mth. above 50.
- Employment (52.7) expanding for the third straight mth., at a faster rate, after 33 mths. of contraction.
- Prices Index (77.9) highest since May, indicating prices rising for 24 mths. running.
- Exports (50.9) lowest since June and imports (51.0) lowest since April; both still expanding.

U.S. ISM Manufacturing PMI Still Expansionary in September; New Orders & Employment Accelerating; Production Moderating

Jonathan Basile

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The U.S. Construction Spending report revealed total construction spending rose 0.9% month-over-month (MoM) in August following a 0.1% monthly decline in July. Over the last three months, nominal construction spending advanced at a 6.6% annualized rate, the best showing on this basis since March 2024. Near-term performance also pushed the six-month trend into positive territory (1.2% annualized) for the first time since February 2025. Recent traction, however, has not pulled the smoother year-over-year (YoY) rate out of the red. August’s -1.7% YoY figure extended the negative streak to 13 months.

Private construction (up 1.1% MoM, -3.1% YoY) accounted more of the headline advance than public construction (up 0.2% MoM). Half of the private construction gain was driven by home improvements (up 2.5% MoM). This component of residential construction has been volatile this year, so the sequential improvement is not an all-clear signal. In fact, home improvements’ August level is still about 8% below the 2026 high point (in March) and nearly 10% below the September 2025 cycle top.

Data centers drive one-third of private construction’s August increase on another strong monthly showing (up 7.5% MoM). The extraordinary AI-related expansion pushed the annual trend to a 73.2% YoY rate. Moreover, the data center share of private construction rose above 5% in August for the first time ever. The progression over the last three Augusts revealed a 1% share in 2023, a 2% share in 2024 and a 3% share in 2025. Construction spending on power facilities also has been swept up in the AI boom. August’s 0.9% MoM rise was the fifth straight, the longest stretch of gains in over a year. The momentum lifted the five-month annualized rate to 16.9% in August, the highest since December 2023. Recent improvement also supported the smoother YoY trend; the 9.7% annual pace was the best since June 2024.

Elsewhere in the private space, everything else was up modestly on the month (single-family and multifamily both up 0.2% MoM and nonresidential ex-data centers up 0.3% MoM). Even with the upticks, it did little to change the YoY trends that remain in negative territory (nonresidential ex-data centers -5.9%, single-family residential -3.5%, multifamily residential -0.6%).

The value of public construction spending continued its quiet gains, extending its winning streak to the six months ended August. On a YoY basis, public construction posted a 2.5% rate, the best performance in eleven months. Highway construction (up 0.1% MoM/4.4% YoY) has been a key support factor.

Construction spending, as it is denominated in nominal dollar terms, can be considered an aggregate budget measure for construction labor trends. Recent construction spending performance could be contributing to the acceleration in job creation in the sector, as reported by payroll provider ADP earlier this week. September’s 15,000 MoM advance for ADP construction payrolls was the best showing since March’s 32,000 MoM increase. It also extended the construction jobs’ winning streak to nine months.

The construction figures can be found in Haver's **USECON** database. The expectations figure is from the Action Economics Forecast Survey in **AS1REPNA**.

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- August headline gain narrowly based.
- Data center heat remains on.
- Public construction’s quiet gains continued.

U.S. Construction Spending: Home Improvement and Data Centers Drove Spending in August

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With inflation and tighter monetary policy now front-line issues, the price index for personal consumption expenditures has arguably become the most important component of this report. Results for August were a bit unsettling. Energy prices jumped 2.3% month-to-month, which left a year-over-year change of 16.8%. Prices excluding food and energy (the core index), rose 0.2%, but the measure almost rounded up to 0.3% (0.247%). The year-over-year change in the core index totaled 3.0%, in line with other readings this year and a full percentage point above the target of the Federal Reserve. Food prices were tame in August: unchanged month-to month and up 1.9% in the past year.

Today’s report included annual benchmark revisions, which affected results back to 2021. The adjustments left the recent year-over-year changes in the PCE price indexes a touch lighter than previously believed. The headline figure for July now shows an increase of 3.4% rather than 3.7%; the core posted a revised advance of 3.0% rather than 3.3%.

The revisions to the price indexes primarily reflected changes in source data. The BEA shifted its source of data on legal services from the CPI to the PPI. Prices for computer software and accessories are now based on information from both the CPI and the PPI rather than the CPI alone. Finally, in calculating the price of portfolio management and investment-advice services, the BEA shifted from the PPI to an implicit-price measure derived from an employment statistic.

The price indexes will probably capture most of the media and market attention, but the income and consumption components are important as well. Nominal personal income rose 0.2% in August, lighter than the averages of 0.4% in the first seven months of this year and in all of 2025. After adjusting for inflation, real personal income fell 0.1%. Compensation of employees and proprietors’ income both rose 0.3% in nominal terms, but these results would translate to little change after adjusting for inflation. Rental income, interest income, and dividends were all light (less than 0.1% in nominal terms).

Despite underwhelming income in August, households spent vigorously, with nominal outlays increasing 0.9% and real spending up 0.6%. Part of this performance could be viewed as catch-up after light spending in July (real outlays up 0.1%), but the data still signal strong economic support from consumers. The figures from this report feed directly into GDP, and results for the first two months of Q3 suggest that the growth of real consumer spending in Q3 could exceed 3.0%, firmer than the average of 2.2% in the first half of this year and 2.1% over the four quarters of 2025.

The personal income and consumption figures are available in Haver’s **USECON** database with detail in the **USNA** database. The Action Economics forecasts are in **AS1REPNA**.

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- Higher energy prices and still-firm increases in core prices.
- Households spend briskly after a pause in July; Q3 activity appears strong.

Personal Income, Consumption, and Prices in August

Economy in Brief: January 2006

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