Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Weakens To Worst Expectation in November

The Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City has now released its November Manufacturing Survey  and it revealed that Tenth District manufacturing activity continued to fall in the month of November. Producers’ expectations were unchanged from last month at modestly positive levels.

Its month-over-month composite index was -6 in November versus a Bloomberg consensus of -1 and with a range of -6 to +1. Unfortunately, that means that the report matched the worst expectation. This KC Fed Manufacturing Index was down from -4 in October and down from a positive 2 in September. The composite index is an average of the production, new orders, employment, supplier delivery time, and raw materials inventory indexes.

Today’s report shows that the district saw a decline in regional factory activity for the second straight month. It also appears that manufacturing firms have put hiring plans on hold for the next six months. The production, shipments, new orders, and order backlog indexes also fell.

The future composite index was stable at 3, and the future production, shipments, and new orders indexes also recorded little or no change.The good news is that managers surveyed expect that overall production and capital spending should rise moderately in coming months.

Today’s report is simply one region, but it is a wide region if you count the number of states in the district. The Fed’s Tenth District covers all of Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska, Oklahoma and Wyoming. It also covers the western third of Missouri and the northern half of New Mexico.

JON C. OGG