Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Unfilled orders: Current (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 recent survey data about manufacturing firms in the Fifth District, the seasonally unadjusted diffusion index for unfilled orders (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) was -11.0 in August 2026, compared to 3.0 in July 2026.
Sample. There are 396 data points in the monthly time series presented in the chart above. The series covers the time period stretching from January 1993 to August 2026.
History. Here's a glimpse of some summary statistics we computed on the whole sample: the diffusion index had a mean of -7.3; it reached a minimum of -54.0 in December 2008; it reached its maximum of 35.0 in May 2021.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-06-30 | 1.0 |
| 2026-07-31 | 3.0 |
| 2026-08-31 | -11.0 |
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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 | 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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