March 2008

Wholesale prices rose 0.3 percent in February, seasonally adjusted, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported. This increase followed a 1.0-percent advance in January and a 0.3-percent decline in December. At the earlier stages of processing, prices received by manufacturers of intermediate goods moved up 0.8 percent in February subsequent to a 1.4-percent advance in January, and the crude goods index rose 3.7 percent after climbing 2.5 percent in the prior month.

Within finished goods, the index for energy goods increased 0.8 percent in February compared with a 1.5-percent gain in the previous month. Prices for consumer foods declined 0.5 percent following a 1.7-percent rise in January. By contrast, …

Concerns about the economy and a steep drop in plans for hiring led to a steep decline in the confidence of distribution and wholesale companies during the fourth quarter of 2007, according to the latest Small Business Research Board report.
 
The study indicated that the Distribution &Wholesale Small Business Confidence Index dropped to 31 during the fourth quarter or 10 points (nearly 25%) from the 41 recorded during the prior quarter. The third quarter 2007 report was the first wholesale and distribution industry confidence index issued by the Small Business Research Board.
 
Declines in two of the three major categories comprising the confidence index contributed to the lower fourth quarter results.
 
Of the respondents, 24% said they believed the …

January U.S. manufacturing technology consumption totaled $308.73 million, according to the American Machine Tool Distributors’Association and the Association for Manufacturing Technology. This total, as reported by companies participating in the USMTC program, was down 26.1% from December, and down 4.0% from the total of $321.50 million reported for January 2007.

These numbers and all data in this report are based on the totals of actual data reported by companies participating in the USMTC program.

Despite the publicized concerns about the U.S. economy, we anticipate that first quarter machine tool consumption numbers will improve as manufacturers start to implement 2008 capital budgets and use the potential savings available from the new economic …