US Industrial production decreased 0.3 percent in April for its fifth consecutive monthly loss. This adds further weight to the view that interest rates hikes to normal levels in the US will be further delayed.
Manufacturing output was unchanged in April after recording an upwardly revised gain of 0.3 percent in March. In April, the index for mining moved down 0.8 percent, its fourth consecutive monthly decrease; a sharp fall in oil and gas well drilling has more than accounted for the overall decline in mining this year. The output of utilities fell 1.3 percent in April. At 105.2 percent of its 2007 average, total industrial production in April was 1.9 percent above its year-earlier level. Capacity utilization for the industrial sector decreased 0.4 percentage point in April to 78.2 percent, a rate that is 1.9 percentage points below its long-run (1972–2014) average.
The Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization statistical release, which is published around the middle of the month, reports measures of output, capacity, and capacity utilization in manufacturing, mining, and the electric and gas utilities industries.
The industrial production (IP) index measures the real output of all manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utility establishments located in the United States, regardless of their ownership, but not those located in U.S. territories; the reference period for the index is 2007. Manufacturing consists of those industries included in the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) definition of manufacturing plus those industries—newspaper, periodical, book, and directory publishing plus logging—that have traditionally been considered to be manufacturing. For the period since 1997, the total IP index has been constructed from 312 individual series based on the 2007 NAICS codes. These individual series are classified in two ways: (1) market groups, and (2) industry groups. Market groups consist of products and materials. Total products are the aggregate of final products, such as consumer goods and equipment, and nonindustrial supplies (which are inputs to nonindustrial sectors). Materials are inputs in the manufacture of products. Major industry groups include three-digit NAICS industries and aggregates of these industries—for example, durable and nondurable manufacturing, mining, and utilities.
