Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity: Capacity utilization: Future (increase vs decrease; diffusion index; percentage points; seasonally unadjusted) - United States - Richmond FED - Monthly
This series is part of the dataset: Fifth District Survey of Manufacturing Activity (Richmond FED)
Download Full Dataset (.xlsx)Latest updates. According to survey data about manufacturers based in the Fifth District, the seasonally unadjusted diffusion index for capacity utilization (share of CEOs seeing a future increase minus share reporting a decrease) was -10.0 in September 2025, compared to -3.0 in August 2025.
Sample. There are 259 records in the monthly series displayed in the plot above. The time span covered by the series is from January 1997 to September 2025.
History. Here’s a quick look at a few statistics we computed on the entire sample: the diffusion index reached a trough of -10.0 in September 2025; it reached its highest level of 48.0 in June 2020; it had an average value of 21.8.
Latest values
| Date | Value - Percentage points |
|---|---|
| 2025-07-31 | 3.0 |
| 2025-08-31 | -3.0 |
| 2025-09-30 | -10.0 |
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Series Metadata
| Field | Value |
|---|---|
| Description | Diffusion index for the question: Will capacity utilization 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 | No |
| Rescaling | None |
| Frequency | Monthly |
| Unit | Percentage points |
| Source | Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond |
| 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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