Recession Looms As Empire Manufacturing Collapse Show No Signs Of A Bounce

Despite some strangely optimistic expectation of a -0.5 print, September Empire Manufacturing printed -14.67, showing absolutely no hockeynesian dead-cat bounce mean-reversion. Hovering at the worst levels since April 2009, the underlying data is a total disaster. New Orders remain firmly negative and inventories collapse (who could have seen that coming?), and even more concerningly, employment and average workweek plunged into negative territory for the first time in over a year.
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The read through the inflation outlook and for jobs – non-hamburger flipping jobs that is – from this report was simply abysmal:
Price changes were quite modest. The prices paid index slipped to 4.1, its lowest level since the Great Recession. The prices received index dipped below zero, falling six points to -5.2 in a sign that selling prices declined. Labor market conditions worsened, with declines in employment levels and hours worked. The index for number of employees fell below zero for the first time in well over two years, slipping eight points to -6.2, and the average workweek index dropped to -10.3.

This post was published at Zero Hedge on 09/15/2015.