這是聯儲局兩個非常重要的兩個經濟指標，於同時公佈且相關性強。工業產值儘管只占美國總體經濟的20％，但是工業產值對經濟週期卻非常敏感，所以這是測試經濟走勢的重要指標之一。設備利用率反映的生產設備的使用情況，對通貨膨脹有較好的預測作用，如果設備利用率高於85％的話，通脹壓力就開始形成，而聯儲局將緊盯這個指標作為利率調整的重要依據之一。
工業產值覆蓋了幾乎整個美國的有形產品，而美聯儲每月都搜尋295個工業部門的資料進行匯總，但是由於要在月份結束候兩周發表初步報告，資料只建立在所需資料的55％的基礎之上。
設備利用率是以85個工業部門的設備利用率為計算的基礎，包括67個製造業、16個採掘業和2個公共事業。
工業生產值測量的是產品數量的變化，不考慮產品價格。
最新資料在2008年1月16日由聯儲局發表：
Industrial production was unchanged in December; the change in the index over the previous three months was little revised, with offsetting revisions to September and October. For the fourth quarter, output fell 1.0 percent (annual rate), the first quarterly decrease since the fourth quarter of 2006. At 114.0 percent of its 2002 average, total industrial production in December was 1.5 percent above its year-earlier level. Output in the manufacturing sector was unchanged in December. The output of utilities decreased 0.2 percent in December as a result of a decline at gas utilities; the output at mines edged up 0.1 percent after an increase of 1.0 percent in November. Capacity utilization for total industry posted a small decrease in December, to 81.4 percent, a rate slightly below its year-earlier level but 0.4 percentage point above its 1972-2006 average.
INDUSTRIAL PRODUCTION AND CAPACITY UTILIZATION: SUMMARY
Seasonally adjusted
Industrial production 2002=100 Percent change
2007 2007 Dec. '06 to
Dec. '07
Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec. Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec.
Total index 114.2 113.7 114.0 114.0 .1 -.5 .3 .0 1.5
Previous estimates 114.4 113.6 113.9 .3 -.7 .3
Major market groups
Final Products 115.2 114.3 114.6 114.9 .2 -.8 .3 .3 1.2
Consumer goods 109.5 108.6 108.7 108.8 .0 -.8 .1 .1 .9
Business equipment 134.2 133.3 134.1 135.3 .8 -.7 .7 .8 2.4
Nonindustrial supplies 111.5 111.0 110.8 110.5 .2 -.4 -.2 -.3 .3
Construction 109.3 108.6 108.3 107.3 -.2 -.7 -.2 -.9 -2.2
Materials 114.3 114.1 114.6 114.3 .0 -.2 .5 -.3 2.3
Major industry groups
Manufacturing (see note below) 116.1 115.4 115.7 115.7 .2 -.6 .3 .0 1.1
Previous estimates 116.1 115.3 115.8 .2 -.6 .4
Mining 101.7 101.6 102.6 102.7 1.2 .0 1.0 .1 .2
Utilities 109.7 109.8 109.8 109.6 -1.6 .0 .0 -.2 6.9
Capacity utilization
Percent of capacity Capacity
growth
Dec. '06 to
Dec. '07
Average
1972-2006 1994-95
High 2001-02
Low 2006
Dec. 2007
Sept. Oct. Nov. Dec.
Total industry 81.0 85.1 73.6 81.6 81.9 81.4 81.6 81.4 1.8
Previous estimates 82.1 81.4 81.5
Manufacturing (see note below) 79.8 84.6 71.6 80.5 80.4 79.8 79.8 79.7 2.1
Previous estimates 80.4 79.7 79.9
Mining 87.4 88.9 84.8 92.3 91.2 91.2 92.1 92.1 .4
Utilities 86.7 93.7 83.8 81.8 86.6 86.6 86.5 86.2 1.4
Stage-of-process groups
Crude 86.5 89.5 82.0 89.6 90.0 89.4 90.6 90.3 .5
Primary and semifinished 82.2 88.2 74.6 81.7 82.6 82.0 82.1 81.7 2.2
Finished 77.8 80.5 70.0 79.0 78.6 78.2 78.0 78.3 1.9
Market Groups
The output of consumer goods edged up 0.1 percent in December, as nondurables advanced slightly but durables decreased. Among durable consumer goods, the production index for automotive products moved up 0.2 percent after having risen 1.4 percent in November. Elsewhere the production index for home electronics edged down 0.2 percent, and the production index for appliances, furniture, and carpeting moved down 1.6 percent with widespread decreases among its components. After having decreased for two consecutive months, the production of nondurable non-energy consumer goods advanced 0.5 percent in December with gains in foods and tobacco, paper, and clothing, and a small loss in chemical products. After having increased a revised 1.8 percent in November, the index for consumer energy goods fell 1.0 percent in December.
The index for business equipment moved up 0.8 percent in December and advanced at an annual rate of 1.6 percent in the fourth quarter. In December, the output of transit equipment rose 2.3 percent; the gain was concentrated in commercial aircraft. After having risen 2.1 percent in November, the index for information processing equipment increased 0.5 percent in December; despite moderate gains in most components, December's rise in this index was held down by a drop in the output of communications equipment. The index for industrial and other equipment moved up 0.4 percent; output for this sector fell at an annual rate of 1.4 percent in the fourth quarter.
The output of defense and space equipment advanced 0.1 percent in December and was unchanged from its year-earlier level.
In December, the index for construction supplies fell 0.9 percent, its sixth consecutive monthly decline; the index was 2.2 percent below its year-earlier level and declined at an annual rate of 5.4 percent for the fourth quarter as a whole. The index for business supplies was unchanged in December.
The production of materials decreased 0.3 percent in December, which partially reversed its November increase. Among non-energy materials, the index for durable materials decreased 0.4 percent in December. A gain in equipment parts was outweighed by decreases in consumer parts and other durable materials; losses were widespread within these categories. The output of nondurable materials moved down 0.4 percent, with declines in all of its major subcategories.
Industry Groups
Manufacturing output was unchanged in December after having increased 0.3 percent in November; manufacturing fell at an annual rate of 1.9 percent for the fourth quarter as a whole. The factory operating rate decreased 0.1 percentage point, to 79.7 percent, a level 0.1 percentage point below its 1972-2006 average. The production of durable goods was unchanged in December and declined at an annual rate of 1.5 percent in the fourth quarter. The output of wood products increased 1.1 percent in December after having declined for five consecutive months. Machinery, computer and electronic products, and aerospace and miscellaneous transportation equipment all posted gains, whereas nonmetallic mineral products and primary metal production posted declines of 2.1 percent and 1.0 percent respectively. The production of nondurable goods edged down 0.1 percent after a gain of similar size in November. Gains in the indexes for food, beverage, and tobacco products and for apparel and leather in December were more than offset by reductions in most other categories. The output of non-NAICS industries (newspaper publishing and logging) edged up 0.1 percent.
The output of mines increased 0.1 percent, and the capacity utilization rate for mining was unchanged at 92.1 percent, a rate 4.7 percentage points above its long-run average. The index for utilities decreased 0.2 percent in December. The output of natural gas utilities fell 3.1 percent, and the output of electric utilities edged up 0.3 percent. The operating rate at utilities decreased 0.3 percentage point, to 86.2 percent, a level 0.5 percentage point below its 1972-2006 average.
Capacity utilization at industries grouped by stage of processing changed as follows: For the crude stage, utilization decreased 0.3 percentage point, to 90.3 percent, a rate 3.8 percentage points above its 1972-2006 average. For the primary and semifinished stages, utilization decreased 0.4 percentage point, to 81.7 percent, a rate 0.5 percentage point below its long-run average. For the finished stage, utilization moved up 0.3 percentage point, to 78.3 percent, a rate 0.5 percentage point above its long-run average.
Notice
Revision of Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization
The Federal Reserve Board plans to issue an annual revision to the index of industrial production (IP) and the related measures of capacity and capacity utilization around the end of March 2008. The revised IP indexes will incorporate data from the 2006 Annual Surveys of Manufactures and data from selected editions of the 2006 Current Industrial Reports, all from the U.S. Census Bureau. Annual data from the U.S. Geological Survey regarding metallic and nonmetallic minerals (except fuels) for 2006 will also be incorporated. The updating will include revisions to the monthly indicator (either product data or input data) and to seasonal factors for each industry as well as changes in the estimation methods for some series. Any changes to methods for estimating the output of an industry will affect the index from 1972 to the present.
After the publication of the revision, later monthly releases will include new or revised indexes for a six-month reporting window: one month of new data and revisions to the previous five months of data. The new longer reporting window will allow the incorporation of additional lagging data before an annual revision. The longer reporting window will cause the latest month of data shown for a few indexes to be as many as five months earlier than the latest value for aggregate industrial production; data for detailed production indexes are not shown in the supplement to the G.17 until either the underlying data are available or the reporting window is closed. Currently, the data issued for only one or two of the published indexes would be affected by this change.
Capacity and capacity utilization will be revised to incorporate data from the Census Bureau's 2006 Survey of Plant Capacity, which covers manufacturing, along with new data on capacity from the U.S. Geological Survey, the Department of Energy, and other organizations.
Once the revision is published, it will be available on the Board's website at www.federalreserve.gov/releases/G17. The revised data will also be available through the website of the Department of Commerce. Further information on these revisions can be obtained from the Board's Industrial Output Section (telephone number 202-452-3197).
Note. The statistics in this release cover output, capacity, and capacity utilization in the U.S. industrial sector, which is defined by the Federal Reserve to comprise manufacturing, mining, and electric and gas utilities. Mining is defined as all industries in sector 21 of the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS); electric and gas utilities are those in NAICS sectors 2211 and 2212. Manufacturing comprises NAICS manufacturing industries (sector 31-33) plus the logging industry and the newspaper, periodical, book, and directory publishing industries. Logging and publishing are classified elsewhere in NAICS (under agriculture and information respectively), but historically they were considered to be manufacturing and were included in the industrial sector under the Standard Industrial Classification (SIC) system. In December 2002 the Federal Reserve reclassified all its industrial output data from the SIC system to NAICS.
從以上數據所見，美國通漲壓力大，為聯儲進一步减息大開綠燈。資訊科技設備有所上升，但通訊設備回落。對提供軟硬件的公司可看高一線。微軟(4338)的股票值得考慮。建築業連續六個月下跌，個人看好電動工具股創科(669)和旺城(2389)。而傢俬股如卡森(496)、順誠(531)、達藝(997)和照明股瑩輝(1163)應看低一線。木材制品在連續五個月下跌後有回升，三林(3938)表現可能持續令人失望。金屬制品的下跌預視賤金屬及礦藏股可能有下跌之勢。
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