Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Local business conditions: Future (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally unadjusted) - 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 unadjusted diffusion index for local business conditions (share of CEOs seeing a future improvement minus share forecasting a worsening) stood at 21.0 in January 2026, compared to 15.0 in December 2025.
Sample. There are 183 observations overall in the monthly series presented in the figure above. The series covers the period stretching from February 2010 to January 2026.
History. Check out a few summary statistics computed on the entire sample: the diffusion index hit a maximum of 54.0 in February 2011; it registered a minimum of -35.0 in October 2022; it was equal on average to 21.5.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-11-30 | -1.0 |
| 2025-12-31 | 15.0 |
| 2026-01-31 | 21.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will local business conditions improve or worsen 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 | No |
| 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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