January Manufacturing Technology Orders Down After a Strong December

March 11, 2015

January U.S. manufacturing technology orders totaled $341.17 million, down 32.9 percent from December’s $508.57 million, according to The Association For Manufacturing Technology.

Staff

January U.S. manufacturing technology orders totaled $341.17 million, according to The Association For Manufacturing Technology. This total, as reported by companies participating in the United States Manufacturing Technology Orders program, was down 32.9 percent from December’s $508.57 million and down 4.8 percent when compared with the total of $358.45 million reported for January 2014.

“To understand why we saw this drop in orders for January, December 2014 saw a sharp increase in sales,” AMT President Douglas K. Woods said in a press release. “This was driven by many end-of-year orders that had been rushed through in order to qualify for tax rebate provisions that were enacted at the last minute for 2014. This is evidenced by the comparatively lower average order value seen in December vs. January, meaning that most end-of-year orders were for less expensive, in-stock machines that could be shipped quickly. The decline wasn’t unexpected, and we still foresee the manufacturing economy keeping on a stable path.”

The USMTO report, compiled by the trade association representing the production and distribution of manufacturing technology, provides regional and national U.S. orders data of domestic and imported machine tools and related equipment. According to AMT, analysis of manufacturing technology orders provides a reliable leading economic indicator as manufacturing industries invest in capital metalworking equipment to increase capacity and improve productivity.

U.S. Manufacturing Technology Orders are also reported on a regional basis for six geographic breakdowns of the United States.

Northeast
January manufacturing technology orders in the Northeast totaled $86.75 million, 2.2 percent higher than the $84.85 million total for December.

Southeast
At $26.33 million, January manufacturing technology orders in the Southeast were off 29.4 percent when compared with January a year ago.

North Central-East
North Central-East manufacturing technology orders in January stood at $93.94 million, down 43.2 percent from December’s $165.54 million but 10.5 percent higher than the January 2014 total.

North Central-West
With a January total of $57.10 million, North Central-West manufacturing technology orders were down 25.5 percent from December’s $76.65 million but up 16.7 percent from last January.