The ISM non-manufacturing (aka ISM Services) index continued its growth cycle but declined. Markit PMI Services Index improved and remains in growth territory.
Analyst Opinion of the ISM and Markit Services Survey
Both services surveys are in expansion – and their intensity of growth and general trends are different again this month. Markit shows this sector’s growth rate is improving whilst the ISM Services growth rate is slowing. Pretty hard to draw conclusions when one survey is improving and the other slowing.
From Econoday:
From Markit:
Business activity growth regains momentum in October
- Output expansion accelerates
- Input price inflation fastest since September 2013
- Rate of job creation dips to nine-month low
- The U.S. service sector reported a strong expansion in business activity in October. The rate of growth rebounded from September’s weatherrelated weakness, but was also buoyed by a sharp rise in new business. Capacity was often reported to have come under some strain, however, and difficulties finding suitable candidates were partly to blame for the rate of job creation easing to a ninemonth low. Meanwhile, price pressures intensified, with rates of both input cost and output charge inflation accelerating.
- The seasonally adjusted final IHS Markit U.S. Services Business Activity Index registered 54.8 in October, up from September’s recent low of 53.5 and broadly in line with the earlier ‘flash’ reading of 54.7. Output growth regained momentum to run just below the average for 2018 so far. Service providers commonly linked the rise in business activity to increased new business and a pick up in demand after inclement weather in September.
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