US industrial output flat as manufacturing gains
Manufacturing output posted its sixth straight increase in February, but unseasonably warm weather again dragged down utilities, keeping total industrial production flat in the month, the Federal Reserve reported yesterday. Multiple manufactured product lines saw increases of one percent and higher including machinery, plastic, paper and metal products, pushing total manufacturing output up 0.5 percent compared to January, the same increase as the prior month.
Motor vehicles and parts were just shy of that mark with an increase of 0.8 percent in the month, reversing the decline of the same amount in January. Manufacturing output - a key focus of President Donald Trump’s administration - was 1.2 percent higher than a year ago. Meanwhile, mining output increased 2.7 percent, and was 1.8 percent higher than February 2016. However, utilities output fell 5.7 percent, nearly the same decline as in January, “as continued unseasonably warm weather further reduced demand for heating,” the report said.
That decline offset the gains in manufacturing and mining, to keep the overall Industrial Production index unchanged, after a drop of 0.1 percent in the prior month, also attributed to unusually high temperatures. Economists had been expecting industrial production to rise 0.2 percent. Industrial capacity in use last month slipped to 75.4 percent, just a tenth lower than in January, and exactly as analysts forecast. — AFP