Industrial production increased 0.5% in March after a 0.1% February increase. Over the last year, industrial production was up 1.5%.
Manufacturing output decreased 0.4% in March, its first loss since August 2016. Production of durable goods fell 1.7%, while nondurables rose 2.1% during the month. Capacity utilization for manufacturing increased by 0.3 percentage point to 75.3%, a rate that is 3.1 percentage points below its long-run average.
The mining index increased 0.1% in March as gains in oil and gas extraction were mostly offset by declines in coal mining and in nonmetallic mineral mining.
The utilities index rose 8.6% in March, the largest increase in the history of the index.
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