Agencies
New York
New orders for US-manufactured goods unexpectedly fell in August, while business spending on equipment appears to have pulled back in the third quarter.
Factory orders dropped 0.2 percent after a slightly downwardly revised 4.9 percent increase in July, the Commerce Department’s Census Bureau said on Thursday. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast factory orders would be unchanged after a previously reported 5 percent rise in July.
The government also reported that orders for non-defense capital goods excluding aircraft, which are seen as a measure of business spending plans on equipment, increased 0.3 percent in August instead of the previously reported 0.2 percent.
Shipments of core capital goods dipped 0.1 percent instead of edging up 0.1 percentas reported last month. Nondefense capital goods orders dropped 1.3 percent, as initially estimated.
Shipments of those goods decreased 1.8% rather than 1.6 percent, as initially estimated. These shipments go into the calculation of the business spending on equipment component in the gross domestic product report. That suggests a moderation in business investment in equipment in the third quarter after double-digit growth in the April-Junequarter.
