ISM Manufacturing Index: Unchanged ... Lowest Growth Since May 2013
Doug Short | May 03, 2015 12:32AM ET
Today the Institute for Supply Management published its monthly Investing.com forecast of 52.0. The indicator remains at the lowest PMI since May 2013.
Here is the key analysis from the report:
"The April PMI® registered 51.5 percent, the same reading as in March. The New Orders Index registered 53.5 percent, an increase of 1.7 percentage points from the reading of 51.8 percent in March. The Production Index registered 56 percent, 2.2 percentage points above the March reading of 53.8 percent. The Employment Index registered 48.3 percent, 1.7 percentage points below the March reading of 50 percent, reflecting contracting employment levels from March. Inventories of raw materials registered 49.5 percent, a decrease of 2 percentage points from the March reading of 51.5 percent. The Prices Index registered 40.5 percent, 1.5 percentage points above the March reading of 39 percent, indicating lower raw materials prices for the sixth consecutive month. While the March and April PMI® were equal, both registering 51.5 percent, 15 of the 18 manufacturing industries reported growth in April while only 10 industries reported growth in March, indicating a broader distribution of growth in April among the 18 industries."
Here is the table of PMI components.
The ISM Manufacturing Index should be viewed with a bit of skepticism for for various reasons, which are essentially captured in Briefing.com's Big Picture comment on this economic indicator.
| This [the ISM Manufacturing Index] is a highly overrated index. It is merely a survey of purchasing managers. It is a diffusion index, which means that it reflects the number of people saying conditions are better compared to the number saying conditions are worse. It does not weight for size of the firm, or for the degree of better/worse. It can therefore underestimate conditions if there is a great deal of strength in a few firms. The data have thus not been either a good forecasting tool or a good read on current conditions during this business cycle. It must be recognized that the index is not hard data of any kind, but simply a survey that provides broad indications of trends. |
The chart below shows the Manufacturing Composite series, which stretches back to 1948. The eleven recessions during this time frame are indicated along with the index value the month before the recession starts.
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For a diffusion index, the latest reading of 51.5 indicates expansion. What sort of correlation does that have with the months before the start of recessions? Check out the red dots in the chart above.
How revealing is today's 0 point change from last month? There are 808 monthly data points in this series. The absolute average month-to-month point change is 2.0 points, and the median change is 1.5 points.
Here is a closer look at the series beginning at the turn of the century.
To reiterate the Briefing.com assessment: "The data have thus not been either a good forecasting tool or a good read on current conditions during this business cycle." The ISM reports nevertheless offer an interesting sidebar to the ongoing economic debate.
Note: This commentary used the FRED here .
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