Empire State Manufacturing Survey: Capital expenditures: Future (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally adjusted) - United States - NY FED - Monthly
This series is part of the dataset: Empire State Manufacturing Survey (NY FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. Based on manufacturing firms' responses to the Empire State Survey carried out by the New York FED, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for capital expenditures (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share forecasting a decrease) stood at 21.6 in March 2026, compared to 18.2 in February.
Sample. There are 297 observations in the monthly time series shown in the chart above. The series covers the time range going from July 2001 to March 2026.
History. Here's a glimpse of a few statistics we calculated on the whole sample: the diffusion index had a mean of 18.7; it peaked at 42.3 in December 2003; it hit a trough of -19.1 in March 2009.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-01-31 | 10.3 |
| 2026-02-28 | 18.2 |
| 2026-03-31 | 21.6 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will capital expenditures increase or decrease over the next six months? |
| Country | United States |
| Economic concept | Business survey response |
| Data type | Leading indicator of the business cycle |
| Deflation method | Not applicable |
| Seasonally adjusted | Yes |
| Rescaling | None |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Unit | Percentage points |
| Source | Federal Reserve Bank of New York |
| Source type | Central bank |
| Data licence | Free use subject to conditions |
| Measure type | Diffusion index (share of respondents reporting an increase minus share reporting a decrease) |
Series in the same data set
Discover the other time series included in this data set.