Manufacturing Business Outlook Survey: Capital expenditures: Future (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally adjusted) - United States - Philly FED - Monthly
This series is part of the dataset: Manufacturing Business Outlook Survey (Philly FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. According to survey data about manufacturers collected by the Federal Reserve in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware, the seasonally adjusted diffusion index for capital expenditures (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share forecasting a decrease) was 30.3 in January 2026, versus 29.1 in December 2025.
Sample. In this monthly series, there are 693 observations. The series covers the time span stretching from May 1968 to January 2026.
History. Here's a glimpse of some descriptive statistics we calculated on the full sample: the diffusion index averaged 18.5; it recorded a maximum of 51.1 in March 1973; it reached a trough of -18.3 in December 2008.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-11-30 | 26.4 |
| 2025-12-31 | 29.1 |
| 2026-01-31 | 30.3 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will capital 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 | Yes |
| Rescaling | None |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Unit | Percentage points |
| Source | Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia |
| 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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