Price Pressures And Strong Employment Highlight Mixed US PMI Data

Some excerpts from the US flash PMI report by IHS Markit, which saw manufacturing PMI miss expectations in October (59.2 vs 60.5 expected), but services handily beating the survey (58.2 vs 55.2 expected). Strong price pressures and employment the key themes:

• "survey-record rise in backlogs of work as firms struggled to meet demand due to supply chain bottlenecks and labour shortages, in turn driving the steepest rise in prices yet recorded by the survey"
• "the services sector ... registered the quickest rate of expansion since July. Meanwhile, the latest rise in factory production was the softest since July 2020 and only mild, as goods producers continued to be severely hampered by material shortages and supply chain delays"
• "Employment increased at the quickest pace since June in spite of further reports of difficulties sourcing candidates and retaining staff."
• Note specifically for services, Delta concerns appear to be waning: "Driving growth in October was the quickest rise in inflows of new work since July, that was commonly attributed to stronger demand conditions as COVID-19 worries eased during the month."
• Modest uptick in the USD and short-end Treasury yields on the data.