Back In Red! Factory Order Plunge -3.6% In October, Largest Drop Since COVID Lockdowns – Confounded Interest – Anthony B. Sanders

US factory orders are back in red.

Factory orders tumbled even more than expected, down 3.6% MoM – the biggest drop since the COVID lockdowns (April 2020). September was also revised lower (making October’s decline even worse) from +2.8% MoM to +2.3% MoM…

Source: Bloomberg

The big monthly decline and revisions dragged orders down 2.1% YoY (the biggest drop since Sept 2020).

Core factory orders also dropped (-1.2% Mom), leaving them down 2.2% YoY – the eight month in a row of annual declines…

Source: Bloomberg

The final Durable Goods Orders data for October confirmed the preliminary print plunge down 5.4% MoM.

Finally, we note that it could have been a lot worse as Defense spending shot up 24.7% MoM (as non-defense dropped 15.8% MoM0…

On a year-over-year (YoY) basis, factory orders grew at a rate of … 0% in October as M2 Money growth remains negative. Apparently, the economy is addicted to gov money printing.

Not a great report with a year until the Presidential elections.