The Chicago Fed’s National Activity Index (NAI) fell to -0.36 in July. That’s down from a +0.10 in June. By itself, the change from positive to negative tells us very little, as does the absolute level below zero. What’s interesting to note about this one measure is the average but more so its rate of [...]
ACT Research, the leading publisher of commercial vehicle industry data in North America, reported last week that freight rates in for-hire trucking had declined in May. It was the fourth month in row when prices had been pressured. More and more, there is a downturn growing in the transportation sector. Commenting on freight rates, Tim [...]
We have arrived at revisions season once again. It’s that time of year when many if not most (I don’t actually keep track) of economic accounts undergo heightened scrutiny. More data is collected from more comprehensive surveys using far larger samples. These are compared to the existing high frequency panels and changes are made as [...]
Next month, in the durable goods series, the Census Bureau will release the results of its annual benchmark changes. In May 2019, the agency will revise the seasonal adjustments going back to January 2002. Unadjusted data will not be, well, further adjusted. None of this, apparently, will include any information gleaned from the comprehensive 2017 [...]
Ever since the widespread adoption of the rules, so to speak, of Positive Economics the discipline has been trading intuitive sense for mathematics. The equations of econometrics are, for Economists, more “real” than reality. To get to those statistical regressions it requires a whole lot of subjectivity. It doesn’t seem that way at first, or [...]
According to Germany’s Zentrum für Europäische Wirtschaftsforschung, or ZEW, the slump in the country’s economy has now reached its fourteenth month. The institute’s sentiment index has improved in the last two, but only slightly. As of the latest calculation released today, it stands at -3.6. That’s up from -24.7 back in October, though sentiment had [...]
In February 2015, IHS Markit thought that the US manufacturing sector might be slowing quite against every expectation. Its final PMI reading for the month of January was 53.9, down quite a bit from highs registered in the middle of 2014. Some of those fears seemed put to rest the following month when the flash [...]
The US economic data begins to trickle in slowly. Today, the reopened Census Bureau reports on orders and shipments to and from US factories dating back to last November. New orders for durable goods rose just 4.5% year-over-year in that month, while shipments gained 4.7%. The 6-month average for new orders was in November pulled [...]
New orders for manufactured goods in the US rose a surprising 1.8% in the month of February, after a record six straight monthly declines. The gain, although nice, follows a downwardly-revised 3.5% drop in orders for the month of January, down from -1.9%. Despite the revision, the data, reported by the Commerce Department, is still better than expected, as economists [...]
New orders for manufactured goods in the US plunged 5.1% in the month of October, the largest decline since the year 2000. The contraction follows a downwardly-revised 3.1% drop in orders in September and a 4.3% drop in August. The data, first reported by the Commerce Department, is worse than expected, as economists were expecting a number closer to 5.0%. [...]
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