Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Vendor lead times: 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. Based on firms' responses to the Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity carried out by the Richmond FED, the seasonally unadjusted diffusion index for vendor lead times (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) stood at 15.0 in August 2026, versus 17.0 in July 2026.
Sample. There are 364 records in the monthly series presented in the chart above. The series covers the time span extending from January 1996 to August 2026.
History. Here are some simple statistics we calculated on the entire sample: the diffusion index hit a peak of 73.0 in May 2021; it reached a trough of -32.0 in December 2022; it was equal on average to 6.4.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-06-30 | 13.0 |
| 2026-07-31 | 17.0 |
| 2026-08-31 | 15.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Did vendor lead times 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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