Construction Expenditures through October 2016

Each month the Commerce Department issues its Construction Put in Place (CPIP) data, usually on the first working day covering activity two months earlier. October data for CPIP was released on Thursday December 1st.

The tables in this report don’t look so good but in fact the single month of October looked a lot better and August and September had upward revisions. This is one time when our three month average (3MMA) preference works against us as it takes longer for an improvement to percolate through. On a rolling 3 months basis year over year total construction declined every month from March when growth was 12.4 percent through September when it was 0.9 percent then improved to 1.2 percent in October. Before the upward revision September was 0.1 percent. The overall total was pulled up by private work which grew at 3.5 percent, state and locally funded work contracted by 4.0 percent and federally funded by 1.7 percent. Nonresidential and residential buildings had positive y/y growth but all four construction sectors had negative momentum. These are non-residential buildings, residential buildings, infra-structure and other which is a catch all for industrial, utilities and power.