Industrial production: strong finish to 2018 Industrial production for December was reported this morning at +0.3%, slightly better than estimates. But what was really surprising is how strong the manufacturing component was, up over 1%: With this reading, YoY industrial production for manufacturing improved to +3.4%, and overall production came in just below 4%: This is in contrast to the sharp slowdown we saw in both the December regional Fed indexes and the ISM manufacturing index. This was a good finish to 2018. Despite this, I am expecting a substantial slowdown within the next 6 months. If the government shutdown proves intractable, the odds of recession by mid-year increase strongly.
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Industrial production: strong finish to 2018
Industrial production for December was reported this morning at +0.3%, slightly better than estimates. But what was really surprising is how strong the manufacturing component was, up over 1%:
With this reading, YoY industrial production for manufacturing improved to +3.4%, and overall production came in just below 4%:
This is in contrast to the sharp slowdown we saw in both the December regional Fed indexes and the ISM manufacturing index.
This was a good finish to 2018. Despite this, I am expecting a substantial slowdown within the next 6 months. If the government shutdown proves intractable, the odds of recession by mid-year increase strongly.