This morning an unexpected decline in U.S. industrial production (for March) led the parade of indicators pointing to a slowing economy.
Industrial production in March fell 0.1%. This comes after a 0.1% increase in February. Economists surveyed by Briefing.com had expected a 0.2% gain in production. Capacity utilization dropped to 78.8% from 79.0% in February.Manufacturing output continued to fall and is now down 1.1% in the first quarter of 2019 from the first quarter of 2018.
A couple of other indicators also pointed to slowing U.S. economic growth. March numbers for box shipments fell more than expected. The number of cardboard boxes shipped and ordered for use by manufacturers and distributors (such as Amazon.com) is a good indicator of the state of the sector. When manufacturers think they will be shipping less stuff, they order fewer boxes. In the same vein trucking company J.B. Hunt Transport Services (JBHT) reported today that container freight carried on the company’s trucks fell 7% in the first quarter. Some of the drop was weather-related, but the drop revived fears of a economic slowdown fueled by such earnings announcements as that from FedEx (FDX) when in March the company lowered its earnings forecast citing sluggish international demand.
