Today, the U.S. Census Bureau published its monthly report on U.S. durable goods manufactures’ shipments, inventories and orders for September 2011 – the report showed a decrease in orders of durable goods and in capital goods compared to August.
According to the recent report, during September 2011, new orders of manufactured durable goods fell by $1.5 billion or 0.8% to $200.3 billion; Shipments of manufactured durable goods also fell by $1.4 billion or 0.7% to $200.1 billion. This decrease came after the shipments inclined for four consecutive months.
Furthermore, the Non-defense new orders for capital goods decreased by $1.8 billion or 2.3% to $76.0 billion; Inventories of manufactured durable goods increased for twenty one consecutive months – last month they have slightly increased $0.4 billion or 0.1% to $365.5 billion.
This report provides a good indicator of the progress of the U.S economy in September. Since the new orders fell, along with the drop in the demand for capital goods, this report sends a negative signal to the market about the growth of the U.S economy.
Some speculate that this report may drive the U.S. stock markets down during the day and will drag along with it major energy commodities prices including crude oil prices.
Currently major commodities are traded with mixed trend as the energy commodities are traded down and the precious metals are traded up, while the Euro and other major currencies are traded down against the USD:
Gold price, short term futures (November 2011 delivery) is traded at $1,713.60 per t oz. a $13.2 increase or 0.78%, as of 15:52*.
Nymex (WTI) rude oil price, short term futures (November 2011 delivery) is traded down by 2.28%, at $91.05 per barrel as of 15:59*.
Euros to USD exchange rate is currently traded down at 1.3831 a 0.55003% decrease as of 16:01*.
(* GMT)
For more on this subject: