The Industrial production of the United States remained unchanged in February, the Federal Reserve reported this Friday (fed), which also revised its estimate for January and indicated that the index rose 0.3% that month.
Previously, the Fed had indicated that industrial production suffered no changes in January, after having chained two months of significant falls, including a 1.4% drop in December -according to revised figures- which was the most pronounced since September 2021.
The index, which measures the percentage of resources used by companies and factories based on all available production plants in the country, stood at 102.6% in February, 0.2% below its level in the same month. of 2022.
The data comes at a time when the Fed is trying to determine the effects on the economy of its interest rate hikes, which it began to apply in March last year to try to curb runaway inflation.
Thus, the rate of utilization of industrial capacity in the US stood at 78% in February. The figure is 1.6 percentage points below its average for recent decades (1972-2021).
Additionally, manufacturing production increased 0.1% and mining production dipped 0.6%, after posting increases of 1.3% and 2%, respectively, last month, according to revised figures.
Utilities production, on the other hand, rose 0.5%. The indicator was one of those that fell the most in January -10.1% according to the revised figures- “since the change from unusually cold weather in December to unusually warm weather in January depressed the demand for heating,” the company said at the time. fed.
The last rise in interest rates by the regulator took place on February 1, the eighth since March last year. It was an increase of 0.25 points, which confirmed a slowdown in the increases.
However, due to fears about the stability of the banking sector after the bankruptcy in recent days of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, whose financial situation worsened as a result of rate hikes, many analysts expect the fed be forced to pause.
With the rise in February, rates stood in a range of 4.5% and 4.75%, the highest figure since September 2007, all with the aim of bringing inflation back to 2%.
Since reaching its peak in June (9.1%) of 2022, inflation in the United States has eased to 6% in February.
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