Crypto News: Supply Lines: Quicker delivery times

Stresses in US supply chains and shortages of materials continue to dissipate, but tight labor markets, tempered consumer demand and excess inventory represent growing challenges for producers.

That summarizes the latest handful of regional Federal Reserve surveys of manufacturers as the central bank prepares on Wednesday to raise interest rates again to tamp down persistent price pressures.

Product lead times for manufacturers largely improved across most regional Fed districts, based on recent surveys of October activity. A measure of supplier deliveries for producers covered by the Richmond Fed showed the fastest times since 2009, when the US was in a recession.

In the Kansas City Fed region, one manufacturer acknowledged that the "supply chain is better, overseas shipments are cheaper and faster, helping reduce prices paid for materials."

One key reason for the overall improvement in delivery times: Softer demand is helping clear a transportation pipeline once stuffed with raw materials, components and finished products.

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The Richmond Fed's orders index shrank the most since 2009, when excluding the immediate aftermath of the pandemic. In Texas, the bookings gauge contracted for a sixth straight month, while manufacturers in the Kansas City and Philadelphia Fed districts registered their fifth months of shrinking orders.

But producers are still having a tough time with staffing — a message that Fed officials will take on board as they convene for their meeting this week in Washington.

Here's how manufacturers in the Dallas and Kansas City Fed regions assessed the labor market:

"Our production constraint has shifted from supply chain to labor," said one respondent in the Dallas Fed's survey released Monday.
Said another: "Inflationary pressure is reducing orders while supply-chain pressure eases, so we have excess inventory for our customers."
One respondent to the Kansas City Fed's survey said that "labor is still hard to find," while another said they were "struggling with finding competent and reliable employees."

—Vince Golle in Washington

Regional Slump | Asia's factories slumped in October as global demand for merchandise goods made in the region continues to weaken. The slowdown adds to growing evidence that a pronounced deceleration in world trade is underway as soaring inflation and interest rates crimp consumer spending in the US and Europe. South Korea recorded its first decline in exports in two years in October, among the clearest signals yet that the global economy is cooling. (Read the full story here.)

MSC's interests | The world's largest container carrier disagrees with another party over how to proceed on a key issue in ongoing contract talks with the union representing 22,000 dockworkers at US West Coast ports.
Shifting from China | Tata Group is planning to multiply the number of employees at its electronics factory in southern India that makes iPhone components, adding tens of thousands of workers as part of a push to win more business from Apple.
Brazil blockade | Protests by backers of Jair Bolsonaro, led by truck drivers, have spread across the country as the Brazilian president remains silent over his loss in Sunday's election, so far refusing to concede defeat to Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva.
Missing expectations | Toyota lowered its production target while sticking to a conservative profit outlook because of a persistent shortage of chips, disappointing analysts who were anticipating an upward revision in the forecast by the world's biggest carmaker.
Resolving differences | The European Union hopes to resolve in upcoming negotiations a dispute with the US over new subsidies for North American manufacturers, a senior diplomat from the bloc said on Monday.
Parched plains | The shrinking Mississippi River has hobbled the most efficient channel for moving US soybeans onto world markets, prompting a shift to alternatives from Puget Sound to Texas and the Great Lakes.
Reach for the sky | Airline passenger traffic in the US has been running above the comparable levels of 2019, the first time that's happened since Covid-19 dramatically cut air travel.
Maritime warning | Russia warned that the security of ships sailing Ukraine's grain-export corridor cannot be guaranteed without additional conditions, increasing risks for Black Sea trade after Russia halted involvement in a key accord.

Lowering the boom | Maersk, which is scheduled to report interim results for the third quarter on Wednesday, said the recent decline in ocean freight rates is likely to continue as manufacturing orders are falling.
Bottoming out | Relative demand in North America's spot trucking market inched 1.3% higher sequentially in the week ended Oct. 28, based on Truckstop's Market Demand Index, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.
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