Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Local business conditions: 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 based in the Fifth District, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for local business conditions (share of CEOs seeing a future improvement minus share forecasting a worsening) stood at 19.0 in July 2026, versus 22.0 in the previous month.
Sample. This monthly series has 189 observations in total. The time period covered by the series extends from February 2010 to July 2026.
History. Here's a snapshot of a few descriptive statistics we calculated on the full sample: the diffusion index had a mean value of 21.4; it hit a trough of -35.0 in April 2020; it recorded a maximum of 54.0 in June 2020.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-05-31 | 15.0 |
| 2026-06-30 | 22.0 |
| 2026-07-31 | 19.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will local business conditions improve or worsen 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) |
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