A new report, Quarterly Economic Outlook Planning For First Quarter of 2018, conducted for PMMI Business Intelligence by ITR, says the majority of segments of the US core economy are expanding, and leading indicators corroborate expectation of accelerating growth into the first half of 2018.
Rising global demand and higher commodity prices contributed to growth in US Nondefense Capital Goods New Orders and both US Wholesale Trade of Durable Goods and Nondurable Goods.
The report says to plan for increasing volume and higher costs over the next three quarters if your business is related to the industrial economy. US Industrial Production is accelerating, up 1.3% year over year in October. The manufacturing and mining components of US Industrial Production are expanding while the utilities sector declines.
US consumers are finding themselves in an optimal economic situation consisting of rising real wages, low unemployment, low inflation, low interest rates, a rising stock market, and relatively-low commodity prices.
US Food and Foods Preparation Production during the 12 months through September was up 3.0% from one year ago. Production transitioned to an accelerating growth rate. Consequently, the forecast was revised as previous forecasts called for slowing growth to persist in the coming quarters. ITR raised the forecast for average annual Production by about 1.7% for 2017, 2.1% for 2018, and 2.7% for 2019.
Production will rise through year-end 2019, though, Slowing Growth will characterize the majority of 2018. US Corporate Profits for Food, Beverage, and Tobacco Products Industries are in Slowing Growth. This indicator typically leads production by about a year and a half and suggests that production will transition to a slowing growth trend by the start of next year, in line with previous forecasts.
As the rate of growth for production slows next year, new-to-market products may help some companies outperform the competition.
Download the entire FREE 20-page report covering a variety of industries such as food, personal care, beverage, pharmaceuticals and medical device.
