Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Inventories of raw materials: 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. Based on firms' responses to the Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity carried out by the Richmond FED, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for inventories of raw materials (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) was 11.0 in February 2026, compared to 8.0 in January.
Sample. In the monthly time series shown in the figure, there are 348 records. The time range covered by the series goes from January 1997 to February 2026.
History. Check out a few statistics computed on the whole sample: the diffusion index had an average value of 14.9; it reached a trough of -25.0 in July 2021; it hit a peak of 35.0 in February 2016.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-12-31 | 10.0 |
| 2026-01-31 | 8.0 |
| 2026-02-28 | 11.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Did raw materials inventories 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) |
Series in the same data set
Discover the other time series included in this data set.