The Federal Reserve Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization report shows industrial production soared 0.8% in December after a November -0.7% decline. The reason for the December increase was utilities. Utilities jumped up by 6.6% on colder weather in December and very warm weather in November. Manufacturing production by itself increased 0.2% and mining was unchanged.
The Federal Reserve Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization report shows industrial production had a 0.1% increase for September. Manufacturing production by itself increased 0.2%. The bigger news is industrial production has declined by -1.0% for the year and manufacturing by itself had no annual growth. Q3 by itself brought better tidings as industrial production rose an annualized 1.8%.
The Federal Reserve Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization report shows industrial production had a 0.7% blowout for July. This is the largest increase since November 2014. Manufacturing production by itself increased 0.5% and was the biggest advance since July 2015. Even mining increased 0.7% for the month. Utilities' 2.1% increase was due to the very warm weather.
The BLS Productivity & Costs report for Q2 2016 shows labor productivity decreased -0.5% annualized. Output increased 1.2% and hours worked increased 1.8%. Unit Labor costs increased only 0.5% in Q2 2015. The reason labor productivity declined was because economic output grew less than worked hours. For the 2015 year, annual productivity rose 0.9%.
The Federal Reserve Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization report reversed itself from last month and had a 0.7% blowout. March though was revised downward to a -0.9% decline. Mining is still repressed but manufacturing showed signs of life for the month. Utilities increase due to the return to seasonal weather from last month.
The April 2016 ISM Manufacturing Survey is a ho-hum month of manufacturing molasses. While in growth, Manufacturing is barely so and inventories are in their 10th month of contraction. PMI was 50.8%, -1.0 percentage point lower than March. New orders dropped -2.5 percentage points but are still in growth. Manufacturing Employment is still contracting and has been for five months.
The Federal Reserve Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization report declined -0.6% in March. Worse, this is the second month in a row for a -0.6% decline. More ominous is a first quarter annualized -2.2% contraction. Mining by itself had the biggest monthly decline since September 2008. It is not just energy production that is the culprit dragging down industrial production.
The Federal Reserve Industrial Production & Capacity Utilization report declined -0.5% for February on mining and utilities. More ominous is an annual -1.0% decline. January was revised to a 0.8% monthly increase. The G.17 industrial production statistical release is also known as output for factories and mines.
The February 2016 ISM Manufacturing Survey is yet another month of manufacturing malaise. Manufacturing is in a 5th month of contraction, although much less so than last month. PMI was 49.5%, 1.3 percentage points higher than January.
The January 2016 ISM Manufacturing Survey is yet month of awful. Manufacturing is in a 4th month of contraction. This time is a smidgen better than December. PMI was 48.2%, 0.2 percentage points higher than the previous revised month. New orders did come out of contraction, but barely, while employment continued to plunge. Only eight sectors showed any growth according to the survey.
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