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I see dr dot org. Well Stocks are starting a new month with games, Banks are rebounding, and Amazon is rallying for a second day after it's better than estimated earnings. Wells Fargo and JP Morgan Chase are up one percent, Haliburton is rallying, and Baker Hughes is declining after those two ditch their twenty eight billion dollar merger. Energy producers
are slipping along with the price of oil. We checked the markets every fifteen Minutestal industrial leverage is currently of one nine points six tents of a percent, creating at seventeen thousand, eight hundred eighty two. Smp F I founded up fourteen points two thirds of a percent to two thousand seventy nine, and as ZAC is up twenty nine point six tents of a percent at forty eight oh
four less. Texas intermediate crude oil down a dollar three of barrel two point two percent to forty eight nine. Spot gold is up a dollar forty announced at twelve nine, and the Tenure Treasury down eight thirty seconds with the yield of one point eight six percent. And that's a Bloomberg business flash. He's taking stock with Kathleen Hayes and Grim Box on Bloomberg Radio. Economic activity in the manufacturing sector, What is it all about and what's happening? That's why
we have Brad Holcomb. He is the chairman of the Institute for Supply Management. Joining us from Tempe, Arizona. Brat Holcomb, always a pleasure. Thanks for being with us, well, thanks for having me, all right, So give us the lowdown on economic activity in the manufacturing sector for April. What happened, Well, the p m I came in at fifty point a
growing for the second consecutive month. We like that because if there's been six prior months of fifty or below fifty, so two months in a row of growth is certainly good news. And New orders and production are also growing, with fifteen of our eighteen industries reporting growth in those two categories new orders and production, even though their indexes are slightly down. All right, So that's the new orders
and production. I want to get more into that, but first I want to get your thoughts on what energy and the collapse and energy prices. How does that read out of the I s M report. Well, let's go right to our prices index SAM. It's up seven and a half percentage points UH to fifty nine. That's two consecutive months of price increases following about a year and a half of price decreases, largely if not entirely, owing
to the oil complex. So going in the in the right direction at er sort of deflationary prices, I think is the right thing. That's certainly reflected in our list of commodities up in price, which includes several of the medals as well as plastics that relate to oil demand, global demand particularly and relate that to the value of the US dollar force. Yes, exports meaning exports of finished goods, is at fifty two and a half nicely, about fifty
up a half a point from last month. That factors into the new orders, which I discussed briefly, that's at fifty five eight, down two and a half overall. But nevertheless, fifty five point eight is good. I think the price of the dollar is certainly helping our exports, uh, in that the prices dollar has attenuated to some degree. And also I think there's some pent up demand from some
prior softness in prior months. Our company cutting inventories. Yes, they're continuing to follow a lean, conservative inventory of raw materials policy. Uh. Forty five point five is the index number down a point and a half, contracting now for ten consecutive months. We saw in our December forecast that that was going to be a policy to watch. And it alone, that is inventories is pulling down the p
m I more so than any other. The direct indexes tell us about some of the anecdotal evidence that you're hearing from the respondents of the survey. Let's start off, if we can with the computer and electronics industry. UH. This has to do UM with I guess demand. Is there enough demand out there well from the computer electronics products? Are specific comment is about oil prices, and while it
says well, oil prices have recovered slightly. The industry is whole continuous to historically struggle greatly, which which we all know about now. Computer and electronics happens to be the largest of the eighteen industries that we follow, and petroleum and coal products is the fourth largest. So we're talking about big industries and the price of oils certainly have having a broad impact. I note also that we're talking about paper products later on in the program because of
the news from International paper. I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about paper and wood products. Is also wood products has to do with housing. Yeah, Starting with wood products, our last comment listed is that the market is is starting to pick up as expected um and that could be certainly a time of year type of common for wood products. Then from printing and related the comment is activity increasing as we moved to our busiest season. So things are moving in the right
direction for those two industreets. And to tell us a little bit about those commodities that have moved up in price, particularly steel, what's going on with steel prices? Yeah, steel prices are going up for the fourth consecutive months. That is steal specifically. Also we've got stainless steel coal rolled hot rolled steel as well. That relates to the price of oil and the amount of energy that it takes to produce steel, as well as the other metals on
the list, and that includes aluminum and copper. And the backlog of orders and what does that tell us about the future. The backlog is growing for the second consecutive months at at fifty point five. That's good because production has not quite been able to keep up with both new orders and sort of seasoned orders, if you will. So it's a positive and sets us up as well as these other indirectors, I think, for more of the same looking forward in the short term. And finally, Brad
Holcomb tell me about buying policies capital expenditures. How's that doing capital expenditures that we talked about. The time frames that it takes to order capital expenditures a hundred and twenty days to get to your order on average. That's down from a hundred and one so on far, but a little bit tight. Thank you very much. Brad Holcomb, Chairman, Institute for Supply Management, joining us from Tempe, Arizona. You're listening to taking Stock on Bloomberg Radio. Coming up on
taking stock. Neither snow nor rain can stay these couriers from the accomplishment of their task. We're talking about the US post Office. That's next on taking stock bloom