Industrial Production: Hard Data Continues to Confirm Surveys

Bottom Line: The Federal Reserve's industrial production report for December offered "hard data" to continue to confirm what we saw in the "soft" (survey) data throughout the 2nd Half of '22. The auto sector saw a second month of declines in December, dragging down electrical components makers. The aerospace industry remains a source of moderate growth, but this volatile sector bears close watching in the 1st Quarter of '23. Overall, this report confirmed the manufacturing sector moved from a tailwind to a headwind for GDP growth in the 4th Quarter.