Preview: Due September 18 - U.S. August Industrial Production - Maintaining a healthy trend
We expect a 0.3% increase in August industrial production with a 0.4% increase in manufacturing, the latter up from a 0.2% increase in July though for manufacturing ex autos we expect a second straight rise of 0.4%. This would maintain a healthy trend, supported by AI investment.
We expect a modest increase in from utilities but slippage in mining where payroll aggregate hours worked were weaker.
Aggregate hours worked were stronger for manufacturing in the payroll detail but unchanged for production and nonsupervisory work. On balance we expect a positive production trend to persist. Most manufacturing surveys remained healthy in August, if not all improved from July.
We expect capacity utilization to rise to 76.4% overall from 76.3%, and this would be the highest since a matching July 2025. For manufacturing we expect capacity utilization to rise to 76.2% from 76.0%. This would be the highest since February 2024.
