{"id":10667,"date":"2023-04-14T14:01:23","date_gmt":"2023-04-14T14:01:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/us-manufacturing-output-falls\/"},"modified":"2023-04-14T14:06:06","modified_gmt":"2023-04-14T14:06:06","slug":"us-manufacturing-output-falls","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/us-manufacturing-output-falls\/","title":{"rendered":"US manufacturing output falls in March; rebounds in first quarter"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> (Corrects month in second paragraph to February from January)<\/p>\n<p>WASHINGTON (Reuters) &#8211;     Production at U.S. factories fell more than expected in March, but eked out a modest gain in the first quarter.<\/p>\n<p>Manufacturing output dropped 0.5% last month, the Federal Reserve said on Friday. Data for February was revised higher to show production at factories increasing 0.6% instead of edging up 0.1% as previously reported. <\/p>\n<p>Economists polled by Reuters had forecast production would dip 0.1%. Output decreased 1.1% on a year-on-year basis in March. <\/p>\n<p>Manufacturing output rose at a 0.3% annualized rate in the first quarter after declining at a 3.1% pace in the October-December period. The modest growth in production last quarter is at odds with surveys that have suggested that manufacturing was in deep recession.<\/p>\n<p>Manufacturing, which accounts for 11.3% of the U.S. economy, is struggling as higher interest rates undercut demand for goods, which are typically bought on credit. <\/p>\n<p>Spending is also shifting from goods to services. Businesses are holding excess inventory as demand slows, reducing the incentive to place more orders with factories. <\/p>\n<p>The Institute for Supply Management&#8217;s measure of national manufacturing activity has contracted for five straight months, with all its subcomponents falling below the 50 threshold in March for the first time since 2009.<\/p>\n<p>Last month, durable manufacturing output fell 0.9%, with producers of long-lasting goods posting declines. Output of nondurable goods slipped 0.1%. <\/p>\n<p>Mining output fell 0.5% after dropping 1.0% in February. Utilities production surged 8.4% after dropping 0.7% in the prior month. The sharp rebound in utilities offset the declines in manufacturing and mining, lifting overall industrial production by 0.4% last month. <\/p>\n<p>Industrial output gained 0.2% in February. Industrial production grew at a 0.2% rate in the first quarter after contracting at a 2.5% rate in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n<p>Capacity utilization for the manufacturing sector, a measure of how fully firms are using their resources, fell 0.5 percentage point to 78.1% in March. It is 0.1 percentage point below its long-run average. <\/p>\n<p>Overall capacity use for the industrial sector rose to 79.8% from 79.6% in February. It is 0.1 percentage points above its 1972-2022 average.<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p>(This story has been corrected to fix month to February, not January, in paragraph 2)<\/p>\n<p \/>\n<p> (Reporting by Lucia Mutikani; Editing by Paul Simao)<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/us-manufacturing-output-falls\/file-photo-startup-rivian-automotives-electric-vehicle-factory-in-normal\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportBusinessNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3D0IN-VIEWIMAGE.jpg\" alt=\"tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3D0IN-VIEWIMAGE\"><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>(Corrects month in second paragraph to February from January) WASHINGTON (Reuters) &#8211; Production at U.S. factories fell more than expected in March, but eked out a modest gain in the first quarter. Manufacturing output dropped 0.5% last month, the Federal Reserve said on Friday. Data for February was revised higher to show production at factories [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":10668,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"spay_email":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1213],"tags":[1223],"class_list":["post-10667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-u-s-business","tag-updated"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-content\/uploads\/Reuters_Direct_Media\/USOnlineReportBusinessNews\/tagreuters.com2023binary_LYNXMPEJ3D0IN-VIEWIMAGE.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10667"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10667\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10696,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10667\/revisions\/10696"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10668"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/lynettelockhart.com\/client\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}