Manufacturing Orders Fall

(Reuters) – New orders for U.S.-manufactured goods fell for a second consecutive month in September, indicating a pullback in business spending on equipment for Q3.

Factory orders dropped 0.5% following a downwardly revised 0.8% decrease in August, according to the Commerce Department's Census Bureau. Economists polled by Reuters had anticipated a 0.5% decline after a previously reported 0.2% decrease in August.

Year-over-year, factory orders remained unchanged.

The government also reported that non-defense capital goods orders excluding aircraft—which serve as a barometer for business spending plans on equipment—rose by 0.7% in September, revised from a previous estimate of 0.5%.

Meanwhile, shipments of these core capital goods fell 0.1%, compared to last month’s earlier estimate of a 0.3% decline. Non-defense capital goods orders decreased 4.4%, a slight improvement from the initial estimate of 4.5%.

Shipments of these goods decreased by 3.4%, rather than the previously reported 3.6%. These shipments factor into the business spending component in the gross domestic product report, signaling a slowdown in business investment in equipment for the third quarter.