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. 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 future increase minus share forecasting a decrease) stood at -2.0 in January 2026, compared to 2.0 in December 2025.
Sample. There are 347 observations in the monthly time series presented in the chart above. The series covers the span of time stretching from January 1997 to January 2026.
History. Here’s a quick look at a few statistics computed on the full sample: the diffusion index was equal on average to -2.3; it attained a maximum of 14.0 in April 2015; it recorded a minimum of -26.0 in May 2021.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-11-30 | 14.0 |
| 2025-12-31 | 2.0 |
| 2026-01-31 | -2.0 |
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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.