The ridiculous economic data continues. Those looking at the headline Philly Fed, which jumped from -1.9 to 5.7, trouncing expectations of 1.0, such as the NY Fed's Simon Potter are pushing buy buttons left and right. And yet anyone who takes the 2 minutes to look at the internals, such as the collapse in the Number of Employees Sub-Index, which tumbled from -7.3 to -10.7 (the lowest since September 2009), the decline in the Average Employee Workweek, or the surge in Prices Paid from 8 to 19, double the change in Prices Received which means plunging corporate profits, or the ever critical New Orders which declined from 1.0 to -0.6, and one can see why this is a report only an Econ Ph.D-cum-Central Planner can love. Finally adding insult to injury, is the 6 month forecast, which unlike all other regional Fed diffusion indices, collapsed by half, from 41.2 to 21.6, as the Hopium at least in the city of brotherly mugging appears to be running out. Stocks kneejerk in every possible direction hoping the Fed will provide a direction.
To summarize from the report [3]:
Price Indexes Increase Slightly
More firms reported paying higher prices for inputs, and the prices received for manufactured goods rose modestly this month. The prices paid index increased from 8 last month to 19 in October, with 30 percent of the firms reporting input price increases. With respect to their own manufactured goods, the percentage reporting an increase in prices (19 percent) was greater than the percentage reporting a decrease (14 percent). The prices received index rose to 5.4 from ]0.2.
Summary
The October Business Outlook Survey suggests that activity among the region’s manufacturing sector has steadied, following several months of reported declines. However, firms reported flat new orders and shipments and declines in employment. Prices for firms’ manufactured goods were moderately higher this month, while increases in input prices were more widespread. The future activity index decreased this month but remained positive, and firms are still generally optimistic regarding growth over the next six months.
Full table:
[4]
And chart:
[5]
And Philly Fed vs NFP:
[6]