In-depth explainers for major US economic indicators, including Fed policy decisions, inflation, labor market data, and business surveys. Focused on trading impact and market reaction.
Core PCE (Personal Consumption Expenditures) m/m measures the monthly percentage change in the prices of goods and services consumed by households, excluding food and energy. It’s built from actual spending patterns rather than a fixed basket, so it tracks how people actually shift their consumption over time. Structurally it sits at the household/consumption end of […]
US quarterly GDP measures the inflation-adjusted value of all goods and services produced in the economy over the quarter, usually reported as a quarter-on-quarter annualised growth rate. In practical trading terms, it is the broadest “scorecard” of US growth: it aggregates household consumption, business investment, government spending and net exports, plus inventory swings. The US […]
The ISM Manufacturing PMI is a survey-based gauge of activity in the US manufacturing sector, compiled from purchasing managers across key industries. It aggregates diffusion indexes for new orders, production, employment, inventories, and supplier deliveries into a single headline number, with 50 as the expansion/contraction line. It is released monthly and is one of the […]
ISM Services PMI is the US service-sector activity gauge compiled by the Institute for Supply Management. It’s a diffusion index built from a monthly survey of purchasing managers across services industries: business activity, new orders, employment, supplier deliveries, inventories, and (separately) prices. Readings above 50 signal expansion, below 50 contraction. It’s released monthly and lands […]
The S&P Global (Markit) Manufacturing PMI is a monthly survey of purchasing managers in the manufacturing sector. It condenses their views on output, new orders, employment, input and output prices, supplier delivery times and inventories into a single diffusion index. Readings above 50 signal expansion, below 50 signal contraction. The “Flash” release, based on most […]
S&P Global (Markit) Services PMI is a monthly survey-based diffusion index that tracks business conditions in the US services sector: consumer-facing industries, business services, finance, transport, tech-related services, hospitality, health and more. It asks purchasing managers about activity, new business, employment, backlogs, prices and expectations, then rolls answers into a headline index where 50 marks […]
Industrial Production m/m tracks the monthly percentage change in real output from US manufacturing, mining, and utilities. It’s a “hard data” volume index: how many goods factories, mines, and power plants are actually producing, adjusted for seasonality and inflation. In the DominionFX indicator map it sits in the real-economy block alongside Capacity Utilization (1.18), and […]
Capacity utilization measures how intensively the US industrial sector is using its installed productive capacity. In practice it is the percentage of total available plant, equipment and infrastructure in manufacturing, mining and utilities that is currently in use. It is published monthly alongside Industrial Production (1.17), so it sits right in the real-economy engine room […]
US Factory Orders m/m tracks the month-over-month change in the dollar value of new orders placed with US manufacturers. It covers both durable goods (machinery, vehicles, electronics, aircraft) and nondurables (chemicals, food, textiles), so it sits squarely in the manufacturing part of the economy. It is compiled from the Census Bureau’s M3 survey and released […]
Durable goods orders measure the monthly change in new orders placed with US manufacturers for goods designed to last three years or more: machinery, vehicles, aircraft, electronics, heavy equipment. It sits in the production and investment part of the economy, mainly reflecting corporate capex and big-ticket household spending rather than day-to-day consumption. The series is […]