Empire State: New York Manufacturing Only Small Improvement

The new orders and shipments indexes remained positive but showed only a small gain in orders and shipments. The prices paid component in the index went down slightly but remained high, while the prices received component of the index rose by 6 points up to 19.3.  There was an uptick to the number of employees rose to the highest level in nearly a year.  The average workweek index fell to a level that indicated only a small increase in hours worked. Future indexes remained quite positive, suggesting a strong and persistent degree of optimism about the six-month outlook.

The inventories index was little changed at 1.2, which suggests that overall inventory levels held steady.

JON C. OGG