Another Ugly Empire Manufacturing Report

The reading was at -14.7 for the month. Econoday was expecting a drop of only 0.50 and Dow Jones was calling for a consensus of -2.0 for September. What investors and economic watchers need to consider here is that this is after the reading of -14.9 in August was the worst in about five years. Another black eye here is that this is the fourth decline of the past six monthly reports.

The index for future conditions fell 10 points to -23.2. Tuesday’s report said:

The September 2015 Empire State Manufacturing Survey indicates that business activity declined for a second consecutive month for New York manufacturers. The headline general business conditions index remained well below zero at -14.7. As in August, declines were reported for both orders and shipments, with the new orders index coming in at -12.9 and the shipments index registering -8.0. The inventories index slipped a point to -18.5, indicating a continuing drop in inventory levels. Price indexes pointed to a small increase in input prices and a small decline in selling prices. Labor market indicators suggested that both employment levels and hours worked contracted. Indexes for the six-month outlook were generally lower than last month, suggesting that optimism about future conditions waned.

Despite August’s report being shockingly bad, the driving theme here is that many of the international data points have gotten worse and many of the woes of China have not fully trickled into the U.S. economy yet.

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The New York Fed polls a group of about 175 manufacturing executives at the start of each month. Economists and investors need to be reminded that this is not the only Fed district manufacturing report. Still, it is the first of the series each month and it bleeds over into expectations elsewhere in the nation. These monthly reports are around the changes from the previous month, so it tries to act as a semi-real-time indicator.

Another day, another ugly manufacturing report.