Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Capacity utilization: Current (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally adjusted) - United States - Richmond FED - Monthly
This series is part of the dataset: Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity (Richmond FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. According to survey data about manufacturers based in the Fifth District, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for capacity utilization (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) was -18.0 in September 2025, compared to 1.0 in August.
Sample. There are 259 records overall in the monthly series shown in the chart above. The time period covered by the series goes from January 1997 to September 2025.
History. Here's a snapshot of some descriptive statistics we computed on the whole sample: the diffusion index recorded a minimum of -53.0 in April 2020; it attained a maximum of 30.0 in March 2004; it had a mean value of -0.8.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-07-31 | -14.0 |
| 2025-08-31 | 1.0 |
| 2025-09-30 | -18.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Did capacity utilization increase or decrease in the past month? |
| Country | United States |
| Economic concept | Business survey response |
| Data type | Coincident indicator of the business cycle |
| Deflation method | Not applicable |
| Seasonally adjusted | Yes |
| Rescaling | None |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Unit | Percentage points |
| Source | Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond |
| Source type | Central bank |
| Data licence | Not copyrightable under U.S. law |
| Measure type | Diffusion index (share of respondents reporting an increase minus share reporting a decrease) |