Fifth District Survey of Non-Manufacturing Activity: Capital expenditures: 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 Non-Manufacturing Activity (Richmond FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. Based on firms' responses to the Fifth District Survey of Non-Manufacturing Activity carried out by the Richmond FED, the seasonally unadjusted diffusion index for capital expenditures (share of CEOs seeing a recent increase minus share reporting a decrease) was -4.0 in September 2026, compared to 4.0 in August.
Sample. There are 190 observations in the monthly series shown in the figure above. The time range covered by the series is from December 2010 to September 2026.
History. Here are a few summary statistics we computed on the full sample: the diffusion index hit a peak of 29.0 in August 2017; it reached a trough of -36.0 in April 2020; it averaged 8.3.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-07-31 | -1.00000 |
| 2026-08-31 | 4.00000 |
| 2026-09-30 | -4.00000 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Did capital expenditures 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) |
| Other information | Not available |
Series in the same data set
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