Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Inventories of raw materials: Future (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 collected by the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for inventories of raw materials (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share forecasting a decrease) was 3.0 in April 2026, versus -3.0 in March.
Sample. In the monthly series displayed in the plot, there are 350 records. The series covers the time span stretching from January 1997 to April 2026.
History. Here's a snapshot of some descriptive statistics computed on the full sample: the diffusion index averaged -2.3; it hit a maximum of 14.0 in April 2015; it registered a minimum of -26.0 in May 2021.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-02-28 | 2.0 |
| 2026-03-31 | -3.0 |
| 2026-04-30 | 3.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will raw materials inventories 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 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.