The national activity index was weaker than expected in June, as it edged down to minus 0.32 from a downwardly revised minus 0.28 in May, indicative of little change in economic activity. Year-to-date, the index has been negative four out of six months, compared to two five out of 12 months in 2022.

In June, three of four categories declined from May and had a negative contribution: Production; sales, orders and inventories; personal consumption and housing.

Employment-related indicators were the only category to improve and to have a positive contribution, although limited, with an index at 0.03 after minus 0.01 in May.

With today's report, Econoday Consensus Divergence Index is at minus 13, indicative of a slightly underperforming economy.

The national activity index in June is expected to rise to a near neutral plus 0.03 (zero equals historical average growth). This would be up from a lower-than-expected minus 0.15 in May that was pulled lower by weakness in production.

The Chicago Fed National Activity Index (CFNAI) is a monthly index that tracks overall economic activity and inflationary pressures. The CFNAI is a weighted average of 85 existing monthly indicators of national economic activity. It is constructed to have an average value of zero and a standard deviation of one. Since economic activity tends toward trend growth over time, a positive index reading corresponds to growth above trend and a negative index reading corresponds to growth below trend.

This index is unique among regional Federal Reserve Bank indexes in that it is national in scope. Investors are eager to have insight into economic growth and inflation. This index combines 85 diverse and already released indicators from four broad categories -- production and income; employment, unemployment, and hours; personal consumption and housing; and sales, orders, and inventories -- into an overall index to measure economic performance. The index provides another measure with which investors can measure overall growth.