Durable Goods Flat vs -0.4% Est — Core Capex Orders +1.6%, Triple the Forecast
Fundamentals · 2026-09-25
New durable goods orders 0.0% m/m vs -0.4% est to $338.6B, after a July revised to +0.9% from +1.1%; ex-transportation +0.3% vs +0.6% est, July revised to +0.7% from +0.4%; ex-defence +0.1%; transportation -0.6% on non-defence aircraft -4.3% after +12.0%; core capital goods orders (non-defence ex-aircraft) +1.6% vs +0.5% est to $87.6B, with July revised to +0.6% from +0.2%; core capital goods shipments +0.6% to $85.0B; total shipments -0.2%, ending eight straight gains; unfilled orders +0.6% to $1,609.4B, up 25 of 26 months; inventories +0.5%, up 11 straight months. Next advance report 27 October.
What It Changes
- The headline beat is aircraft arithmetic, and the core-capex beat is the real news. Orders were expected to fall on an aircraft give-back and held flat; underneath, core capital goods orders rose 1.6% against 0.5%, and July was revised up from 0.2% to 0.6%.
- Business equipment demand is accelerating, not fading. Core capex orders are up about 17% annualized over three months and 14.8% on the year (not seasonally adjusted, not inflation-adjusted) — that is the AI and equipment cycle showing up in domestic orders, which last month's +0.2% said it was not.
- Ex-transportation missed, and the miss is narrow. +0.3% against +0.6%, with fabricated metals (-1.3%) the drag; machinery, electrical equipment and primary metals all rose more than 1%.
- For the Fed, it is one more strong print. Strong capex adds to the case the hike pricing already rests on; it does not change the path on its own, and today's inflation-expectations read carries more weight for that.
Impact
- USD — Slight bullish — a core-capex beat on top of a strong week of US data (claims 197K, composite PMI 58.4, new home sales 684K) supports the growth side of the hike pricing, with October odds near 70% (Trading Economics, per this morning's Open).
- The dollar came into 08:30 soft, DXY 101.05, -0.20% (TradingView, pre-open), on yen strength and lower oil after the Hormuz report — this release pushes against that dip rather than creating a move of its own.
- US Indices (ES / NQ / YM / RTY) — Mixed, lean bullish — rising equipment orders are good for earnings and for the industrials in YM, but every strong print this week has been read through the 10-year, which was 5.175% overnight after touching 5.225% on Thursday.
- NQ carries the capex story directly. Computers and electronics orders were flat, but the core-capex total is where AI-related equipment demand lands, and it is the demand NQ's hardware names sell into.
- Gold (GC) — Slight bearish — stronger growth data keeps real yields supported; gold was $4,341.50, +$43.50 overnight on the Hormuz headlines, and this print leans against that bid rather than reversing it.
Inside The Number
New orders for manufactured durable goods were virtually unchanged at $338.6 billion in August, down $0.1 billion, against a consensus for a 0.4% decline. July was revised to +0.9% from a first-reported +1.1%. Census attributes the month to transportation equipment, down three of the last four months, which fell $0.7 billion or 0.6% to $114.1 billion.
The transportation line is aircraft. Non-defence aircraft and parts orders fell 4.3% to $18.8 billion, a $0.85 billion decline, after surging 12.0% in July. That is the give-back the consensus was built around; it was simply smaller than expected. Motor vehicles and parts fell 0.6%, about $0.43 billion. Defence aircraft rose 5.9%, $0.34 billion. Aircraft orders are lumpy by nature — a handful of large contracts can swing them by billions — so the headline says little about the rest of manufacturing.
Excluding transportation, orders rose 0.3%, $0.7 billion, to $224.5 billion — below the 0.6% consensus. July's ex-transport figure was revised up to +0.7% from +0.4%, so part of the miss is a higher base. By industry:
- Primary metals +1.2%, a third straight monthly gain, to $32.6 billion.
- Machinery +1.1% to $45.5 billion, its third straight rise.
- Electrical equipment, appliances and components +1.1% to $19.0 billion.
- Computers and electronic products flat at $30.9 billion, with computers +1.5% and communications equipment +0.3%.
- Fabricated metal products -1.3% to $45.0 billion, the largest decline outside transportation and the main reason ex-transport missed.
- All other durables +0.4%.
Core capital goods orders are the number this release exists for, and they beat by a wide margin. Non-defence capital goods excluding aircraft rose 1.6%, $1.4 billion, to $87.6 billion, against a 0.5% consensus. July was revised to +0.6% from +0.2%, and June stands at +1.7%. That is three straight monthly gains worth roughly 17% annualized — an approximation, because it compounds Census's rounded monthly rates. Not seasonally adjusted, August core orders were 14.8% above August 2025, and year to date they are up 10.6%.
Last month's brief read the opposite. On 26 August the headline was that core capital goods orders "managed just +0.2%" — set against an import surge, the AI buildout looked like it was being sourced abroad. The revision to +0.6% and this month's +1.6% change that. Imports can still be doing most of the work (yesterday's current-account release showed goods imports at their highest since 2025:Q1), but domestic orders for business equipment are now rising at a double-digit pace too.
Core shipments feed GDP, and they are rising. Core capital goods shipments rose 0.6% to $85.0 billion, after +1.4% in July and +2.4% in June — about 19% annualized over three months on the same rounded basis. Those shipments are the input to the equipment component of business investment in GDP. Orders running ahead of shipments — core orders of $87.6 billion against shipments of $85.0 billion — points to more shipments to come.
Total shipments fell for the first time in nine months. Durable goods shipments slipped 0.2% to $333.8 billion, ending eight consecutive increases, with transportation shipments down 1.8% and non-defence aircraft shipments down 8.6%. Excluding transportation, shipments rose 0.6%.
The backlog keeps building. Unfilled orders rose $9.8 billion or 0.6% to $1,609.4 billion, up in 25 of the last 26 months, with transportation up 12 of the last 13. Inventories rose 0.5% to $608.1 billion, up 11 consecutive months. Unfilled orders are 8.8% above a year ago (not seasonally adjusted); inventories are 3.0% above. A backlog growing almost three times faster than inventories is a factory sector with more work booked than it is holding in stock.
None of this is inflation-adjusted. Census reports nominal dollars, and with inflation running above 3%, part of the 14.8% year-over-year gain in core orders is price rather than volume — the real gain is still strong, but smaller than the headline suggests.
The Internals
New orders, seasonally adjusted, billions of dollars:
Category · August · July revised · August change · July change · Consensus
Durable goods, total · 338.6 · 338.7 · 0.0% · +0.9% · -0.4%
Excluding transportation · 224.5 · 223.8 · +0.3% · +0.7% · +0.6%
Excluding defence · 313.4 · 313.2 · +0.1% · +1.4% · n/a
Core capital goods (non-defence ex-aircraft) · 87.6 · 86.3 · +1.6% · +0.6% · +0.5%
Non-defence capital goods · 100.5 · 99.3 · +1.2% · +2.3% · n/a
Defence capital goods · 21.5 · 21.9 · -1.5% · -6.4% · n/a
Capital goods, total · 122.1 · 121.2 · +0.7% · +0.6% · n/a
July, first reported against revised:
Series · First reported · Revised
Durable goods orders · +1.1% · +0.9%
Excluding transportation · +0.4% · +0.7%
Excluding defence · +1.3% · +1.4%
Core capital goods orders · +0.2% · +0.6%
New orders by industry, seasonally adjusted, billions of dollars:
Industry · August · Change · July change · June change
Primary metals · 32.6 · +1.2% · +2.1% · +1.9%
Fabricated metal products · 45.0 · -1.3% · +0.3% · -0.1%
Machinery · 45.5 · +1.1% · +1.5% · +1.3%
Computers and electronic products · 30.9 · 0.0% · -0.7% · +3.1%
Computers and related products · 2.9 · +1.5% · -0.6% · +0.2%
Communications equipment · 5.3 · +0.3% · +1.8% · +1.0%
Electrical equipment and appliances · 19.0 · +1.1% · 0.0% · +1.7%
Transportation equipment · 114.1 · -0.6% · +1.2% · -0.5%
Motor vehicles and parts · 73.3 · -0.6% · +0.8% · -0.3%
Non-defence aircraft and parts · 18.8 · -4.3% · +12.0% · -2.9%
Defence aircraft and parts · 6.1 · +5.9% · -13.0% · -7.0%
All other durable goods · 51.5 · +0.4% · +0.6% · +0.3%
Shipments, seasonally adjusted, billions of dollars:
Category · August · Change · July change · June change
Durable goods, total · 333.8 · -0.2% · +0.9% · +1.0%
Excluding transportation · 224.4 · +0.6% · +0.8% · +1.2%
Transportation equipment · 109.5 · -1.8% · +1.1% · +0.5%
Non-defence aircraft and parts · 16.3 · -8.6% · +0.5% · -0.8%
Core capital goods · 85.0 · +0.6% · +1.4% · +2.4%
Non-defence capital goods · 95.5 · -1.3% · +1.4% · +1.9%
Backlog and stock, seasonally adjusted, billions of dollars:
Measure · August · Change · Streak · vs year ago, not adjusted
Unfilled orders, total · 1,609.4 · +0.6% · Up 25 of 26 months · +8.8%
Unfilled orders, transportation · 1,009.8 · +0.5% · Up 12 of 13 months · +9.8%
Unfilled orders, core capital goods · 316.8 · +0.8% · n/a · +5.4%
Inventories, total · 608.1 · +0.5% · Up 11 straight months · +3.0%
Inventories, transportation · 192.7 · +0.6% · Up 10 of 11 months · +2.3%
Year to date, not seasonally adjusted, against the same months of 2025:
Series · 2026 year to date · Change
Durable goods orders · $2,638.9B · +7.7%
Excluding transportation · $1,743.4B · +9.6%
Core capital goods orders · $665.7B · +10.6%
Core capital goods shipments · $649.7B · +8.5%
Non-defence aircraft orders · $162.1B · -22.1%
Defence capital goods orders · $156.2B · +41.8%
Where The Orders Came From
Two stories sit on either side of the capital goods line. Non-defence aircraft orders are 22.1% below last year to date, and defence capital goods orders are 41.8% above. The first is a comparison against 2025's much larger aircraft order book; the second is a defence procurement build that has run all year. In August, defence capital goods orders fell 1.5% after a 6.4% drop in July, but the year-to-date gap is large enough that one or two soft months do not change it.
The core capex gain was broad-based. Machinery rose 1.1% for a third straight monthly gain. Electrical equipment rose 1.1%. Computers rose 1.5%, and communications equipment 0.3%. The one sizeable decline outside transportation, fabricated metals at -1.3%, largely sells components to other manufacturers rather than finished equipment.
Computers and communications are the AI-adjacent lines, and they are growing fastest. Year to date, computers and related products orders are up 20.1% and communications equipment up 35.8%, against 9.6% for all ex-transport orders. Both are small in dollars — together about $8.2 billion a month — but they are growing at two to four times the rate of the rest of the factory sector. Semiconductor orders are excluded from Census's order data entirely, so the most direct AI line is not in this release at all.
The metals chain is strong upstream. Primary metals orders rose for a third month and are up 15.3% year to date, with unfilled orders up 10.2% on the year. That is consistent with the tariff-protected steel and aluminum pricing firms have been citing, though Census does not split price from volume.
The one soft consumer-facing line is autos. Motor vehicles and parts orders fell 0.6% in August and unfilled orders there are 0.1% below a year ago — alongside the small all-other-durables category, the only line in the release with a shrinking backlog.
Against This Morning's Open
- The Open had the consensus right and flagged the priors correctly — The Open tabled durables at -0.3% to -0.4% against a 1.1% prior, ex-transport at 0.6% against 0.4%, and core capital goods at 0.5% against a prior it listed as "0.0%-0.2%, sources differ".
- Census settled the disputed prior. July core capex was first reported at +0.2% and is now +0.6% — neither of The Open's two sources had the revised figure, because it did not exist until 08:30.
- The Open's call that 10:00 matters more than 08:30 still stands. It described durables as "a volatile, transport-driven headline", which is right about the headline and understates the core-capex line, but a capex beat does not move the rate path the way an inflation-expectations surprise can.
What This Sets Up
- Full report — Friday 2 October, 10:00 ET, with revised durables and the nondurable goods data; August's core-capex figure can move again there.
- Next advance report — Tuesday 27 October, 08:30 ET, covering September.
- Whether core capex holds above 1%. Three straight gains and a 1.6% print puts the series on a double-digit annualized run; a fourth month would confirm that domestic equipment demand has joined the import surge.
- Whether aircraft stabilizes. After +12.0% and -4.3%, non-defence aircraft orders are the swing factor in every headline, and year to date they are still 22.1% below 2025.
What Is This?
- What it is: The Census Bureau's advance report on durable goods manufacturers' shipments, inventories and orders, from the M3 survey of about 4,700 reporting units at roughly 3,000 companies. Durable goods are items meant to last three years or more. New orders are booked when a customer commits, not when the product ships, so they lead factory output. Figures are seasonally adjusted but not inflation-adjusted, and semiconductor orders are excluded. Release CB 26-149, covering August 2026.
- Why it matters: It carries the cleanest monthly read on business investment: core capital goods orders, meaning non-defence capital goods excluding aircraft. Core capital goods shipments feed the equipment line of GDP directly. With AI-related equipment spending the main growth story this year, this is the series that shows whether that spending is reaching US factories.
- How to read it: Skip the headline and go to core capex. The total swings on aircraft, where a few large orders can move billions in a month. Watch revisions — last month's core print moved from +0.2% to +0.6% — and the full report a week later can move it again. Census publishes no confidence intervals, because the panel is not a probability sample, so small monthly changes carry unknown error. And the data are nominal: a gain partly reflects higher prices, not only more goods.
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_For informational purposes only. Not investment advice._