US durable goods preview: Greater focus to be upon core orders – Scotiabank

The Scotiabank analysts offer a detailed preview of the upcoming January US durable goods data due later on Wednesday at 1230 GMT.

Key Quotes:

“The headline reading is likely to be dented by a large drop in Boeing’s plane orders that fell from a relatively high 218 in December down to 46 in January.  

The greater focus will be upon core orders as a gauge of momentum in underlying business investment.  

Orders excluding defense and aircraft have fallen by about 1% in each of the prior two months and four out of the past five months. This is a common challenge across much of the world economy as capital spending is suffering in part from the uncertainty imposed by the Trump administration’s protectionist trade policies but also by uncertainty toward the underlying health of the global economy.

This is evidenced by the relative underperformance of the capital goods subindex on the S&P500 since the trade conflicts with China began to intensify last Spring.”