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October 2017 Manufacturing New Orders Marginally Decline

By Kurt Osterberg · On December 4, 2017

US Census says manufacturing new orders marginally declined. Out analysis agrees – but the rolling averages were unchanged.

Analyst Opinion of Census Manufacturing Sales

According to the seasonally adjusted data, it was civilian aircraft / ships and boats that caused the decline. The data in this series is noisy so I would rely on the unadjusted 3 month rolling averages which were unchanged this month.

Remember the headline numbers are not inflation adjusted..

Backlog of orders continues in expansion year-over-year – but just barely. And this data is not inflation adjusted which mean backlog is likely contracting.

US Census Headline:

The seasonally adjusted manufacturing new orders is down 0.1 % month-over-month.

Market expected (from Bloomberg / Econoday) month-over-month growth of -0.8 % to -0.1 % (consensus -0.4 %).

Manufacturing unfilled orders was unchanged month-over-month, and up 0.5 % year-over-year.

Econintersect Analysis:.

Unadjusted manufacturing new orders growth decelerated 0.2 % month-over-month, and up 5.2 % year-over-year.

Unadjusted manufacturing new orders (but inflation adjusted) up 1.7 % year-over-year.

Three month rolling new order rolling averages was unchanged month-over-month, and is up 5.5 % year-over-year.

Unadjusted manufacturing unfilled orders growth decelerated 0.1 % month-over-month, and up o.5 % year-over-year

As a comparison to the inflation adjusted new orders data, the manufacturing subindex of the Federal Reserves Industrial Production growth up 1.3 % month-over-month, and up 2.7 % year-over-year.

Seasonally Adjusted Manufacturing Value of New Orders – All (red line, left axis), All except Defense (green line, left axis), All with Unfilled Orders (orange line, left axis), and all except transport (blue line, right axis)