Empire State Manufacturing Survey: General business activity: Future (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally unadjusted) - 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 unadjusted diffusion index for general business activity (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share forecasting a decrease) was 21.6 in August 2026, compared to 16.0 in July.
Sample. In this monthly time series, there are 302 records. The span of time covered by the series is from July 2001 to August 2026.
History. Here's a glimpse of some summary statistics we calculated on the entire sample: the diffusion index attained a maximum of 72.0 in April 2002; it registered a minimum of -23.0 in September 2001; it was equal on average to 34.2.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-06-30 | 21.8 |
| 2026-07-31 | 16.0 |
| 2026-08-31 | 21.6 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will general business activity 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 | No |
| 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) |
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