US: Business activity continues to rise at historically subdued pace in April - Markit

Eren Sengezer FXStreet

"Growth of business activity was sustained in April, albeit at a relatively modest pace in line with fairly limited gains in new orders" said Markit on Wednesday.

Key quotes:

With companies able to comfortably deal with current workloads, staffing levels rose at the slowest pace in nearly seven years
The seasonally adjusted Markit U.S Services Business Activity Index continued to record above the crucial 50.0 no-change mark during April, registering 53.1, up from 52.8 in the previous month
Growth in activity has now been recorded in each survey period since March 2016
April’s rate of expansion was well down on the survey average, which in part reflected another month of relatively subdued growth in new business
Faced with under-whelming growth in new business, the vast majority of companies (90%) reported no-change to their workforce numbers during the month.

Author

Eren Sengezer

FXStreet

As an economist at heart, Eren Sengezer specializes in the assessment of the short-term and long-term impacts of macroeconomic data, central bank policies and political developments on financial assets.

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