Of the three regional manufacturing surveys released for April, all were in contraction.
Analyst Opinion of Kansas City Fed Manufacturing
Kansas City Fed manufacturing has been one of the more stable districts. Note that the key internals declined. This survey should be considered much worse than last month’s.
Market expectations from Econoday were —- to —- (consensus —). The reported value was -30. Any value below zero is in contraction.
z kansas_man.PNG
The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City released the April Manufacturing Survey today. According to Chad Wilkerson, vice president and economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, the survey revealed that Tenth District manufacturing activity decreased further to the lowest reading in survey history (since 1994), while expectations for future activity improved but remained slightly negative.
“Regional factory activity continued to decline in April, with our composite index falling to the lowest level in survey history as firms continued to be negatively impacted by COVID-19,” said Wilkerson. “Many firms also reported employment changes in response to coronavirus.”
Factory Activity Decreased Further in April
The month-over-month composite index was -30 in April, the lowest composite reading in survey history, and down considerably from -17 in March and 5 in February (Table 1). The composite index is an average of the production, new orders, employment, supplier delivery time, and raw materials inventory indexes. The decrease in district manufacturing activity was steepest at durable goods factories such as primary and fabricated metals, and activity at non-durable goods plants including food and beverage manufacturing declined as well. All month-over-month indexes dropped further in April except for supplier delivery time which continued to increase. Year-over-year factory indexes also decreased again in April, and the composite index fell from -14 to -30. The future composite index improved from -19 April, but remained slightly negative at -6.
Summary of all Federal Reserve Districts Manufacturing:
Richmond Fed (hyperlink to reports):
z richmond_man.PNG​
Dallas Fed (hyperlink to reports):
z dallas_man.PNG
Philly Fed (hyperlink to reports):
z philly fed1.PNG
New York Fed (hyperlink to reports):
z empire1.PNG
Federal Reserve Industrial Production – Actual Data (hyperlink to report):
Holding this and other survey’s Econintersect follows accountable for their predictions, the following graph compares the hard data from Industrial Products manufacturing subindex (dark blue bar) and US Census manufacturing shipments (red bar) to the Kansas City Fed survey (light green bar).
Comparing Surveys to Hard Data:
z survey1.png
In the above graphic, hard data is the long bars, and surveys are the short bars. The arrows on the left side are the key to growth or contraction.
include(“/home/aleta/public_html/files/ad_openx.htm”); ?>