Chart of the day: Industrial Production

By Edward Harrison On Jun 17, 2008

Industrial production and capacity utilization numbers were released by the Fed this morning. These numbers are important because production is one of five factors the NBER (National Bureau of Economic Research) looks at to judge recessions. The numbers were not good.

Production was down y-o-y for the first time since May 2002 besides a blip in May 2003. This is a classic sign of economic weakness. Industrial capacity utilization was also down to 79.39%, down from 80.89% a year ago. This too is the worse number we’ve seen since May 2002.

In short, production is saying we are in recession.

This post is part of my chart of the day series.

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Edward Harrison 7783 posts 575 comments

Edward Harrison is a senior Editor at Bloomberg. He is also the founder of Credit Writedowns newsletter, a former career diplomat, investment banker and technology executive with over twenty five years of business experience. He speaks six languages and reads another five, skills he uses to provide a more global perspective. Edward holds an MBA in Finance from Columbia University and a BA in Economics from Dartmouth College.

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