{"id":63505,"date":"2025-10-06T14:33:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-06T14:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/63505\/"},"modified":"2025-10-06T14:33:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-06T14:33:08","slug":"weaker-us-market-chemical-production","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/63505\/","title":{"rendered":"Weaker US Market, Chemical Production"},"content":{"rendered":"

As the US job market weakens and consumer confidence continues to wane, impacting the domestic chemicals market, global chemical production edges up slightly, the American Chemistry Council (ACC) notes in its latest weekly\u00a0report<\/a>.<\/p>\n

As of Monday, the US government remains shut down, so federal jobs and other economic reports that were scheduled for release are not available. For its report, released on October 3, the ACC cited alternative, private sector data, from sources such as ADP.\u00a0 (The ADP serves as a proxy for US Bureau of Labor and Statistics non-farm payrolls data.) That data shows that private sector employment in the US fell during the month of September. Still, The Challenger Report found that US-based employers cut fewer jobs last month compared to August, at 37% lower, and were 26% lower year-over-year.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, job openings stayed flat in August, at 7.2 million. That\u2019s the lowest number since September 2024, \u201cand, except for that month, the lowest since the pandemic,\u201d the ACC noted in its report. Additionally, quits and layoffs remained flat since July.<\/p>\n

Consumer confidence dipped in September, with expectations of business conditions and employment prospects worsening. Regarding purchasing plans, the ACC pointed to data from The Conference Board, a global, nonprofit think tank and business membership organization. The Conference Board reported that plans to buy cars declined while home purchase plans increased to \u201ca four-month high.\u201d Consumers also reported an increase in plans to purchase electronic goods, the nonprofit\u2019s report found, especially smartphones.<\/p>\n

Related:Industry Groups Raise Concerns About Proposed Rail Merger<\/a><\/p>\n

Looking at the manufacturing sector: the ACC also shared data from the Institute for Supply Management\u2019s (ISM\u2019s) Purchasing Managers’ Index for the US manufacturing sector. In September, the sector rose 0.4 points to 49.1. Despite the bump, that\u2019s reportedly the seventh consecutive month below 50, which indicates manufacturing activity contracted, though at a slower pace than in August. Turning to the chemical industry in the US, details within the ISM PMI report indicate that the industry is in contraction.<\/p>\n

US indicators seem to fall in line with the international picture. The JP Morgan Global Manufacturing PMI also hovered close to 50 in September, dipping 0.1 points to 50.8.<\/p>\n

The ACC\u2019s Global Chemical Production Regional Index (Global CPRI) did see a 0.2% gain in July, and a spike in August, with a 0.7% increase. The production gains were in the Asia and South America regions, while all other regions declined. In particular, production in China \u201caccelerated after three months of lackluster growth, possibly reflecting renewed strength in EV exports.\u201d<\/p>\n

Related:How to Build Better Manufacturing OEE with AI<\/a><\/p>\n

Although industrial demand improved, US chemical production continued a decline, \u201cas trade-related uncertainty continued to weigh on customer demand,\u201d the ACC noted in the weekly report.<\/p>\n

\u201cFollowing gains in July, the US CPRI declined by 0.1% in August, marking the seventh consecutive decline in eight months,\u201d according to the ACC\u2019s report.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"As the US job market weakens and consumer confidence continues to wane, impacting the domestic chemicals market, global…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":63506,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[72,61,60,123],"class_list":["post-63505","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-markets","tag-business","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-markets"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63505","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=63505"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63505\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/63506"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=63505"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=63505"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=63505"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}