Industrial Production Edges Up 0.2% in May

Production at U.S. factories, mines and utilities edged up 0.2% in May, the Federal Reserve said Friday.

The increase, while lower than most analysts expected, according to Bloomberg, is good news for trucking. The manufacturing sector is one of trucking’s largest and most important customers, and when it is growing, the demand for trucking services generally rises.

There was more good news for trucking in a separate report released Friday by the U.S. Department of Commerce that said business inventories fell 0.2% in April to their lowest point since October 1999.

Generally, as companies reduce their inventories through sales, they replenish stocks with new products, boosting demand for trucking.

The reduction in inventories, the 15th in as many months, was coupled with a 1.8% increase in sales, Commerce said. With the 0.2% drop, business inventories totaled $1.11 billion in April.

Manufacturing production, the most important component of the industrial production report to trucking, rose 0.2% in May, the Fed reported.

Also included in the Fed report was the news that the rate of capacity utilization rose to 75.5% of peak efficiency in May from a 75.4% rate in April.

Analysts had expected production to rise 0.3% in May and capacity utilization to jump to 75.6%, Bloomberg reported.

Analysts told Bloomberg they expected inventories to drop 0.2% in April. The April drop followed a 0.3% decrease in inventories during March.

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