Fifth District Survey of Non-Manufacturing Activity: Equipment and software expenditures: 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 Non-Manufacturing Activity (Richmond FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. Based on a sample of nonmanufacturing firms surveyed by the Fed, the seasonally unadjusted diffusion index for equipment and software expenditures (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share forecasting a decrease) was 4.0 in September 2026, compared to 14.0 in August.
Sample. In this monthly series, there are a total of 190 observations. The time range covered by the series extends from December 2010 to September 2026.
History. Have a look at a few simple statistics we calculated on the entire sample: the diffusion index reached its minimum of -5.0 in April 2020; it peaked at 42.0 in November 2021; it had an average value of 19.9.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2026-07-31 | 10.0000 |
| 2026-08-31 | 14.0000 |
| 2026-09-30 | 4.00000 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will equipment and software expenditures 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) |
| Other information | Not available |
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