Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Unfilled orders: 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. According to survey data about manufacturers collected by the Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for unfilled orders (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) was -13.0 in January 2026, compared to -7.0 in December 2025.
Sample. There are 389 observations overall in the monthly series shown in the graph above. The series covers the time period extending from January 1993 to January 2026.
History. Here's a peek at some statistics we calculated on the full sample: the diffusion index had an average value of -7.3; it reached its minimum of -50.0 in February 2009; it achieved a maximum of 31.0 in May 2021.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-11-30 | -23.0 |
| 2025-12-31 | -7.0 |
| 2026-01-31 | -13.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Did unfilled orders 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
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