Electrical Marketing's Leading Economic Indicators - May 30 2025 Update
Single-family building permits sink -5.1% in April
Privately-owned housing units authorized by building permits in April were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1,412,000, -4.7% below the revised March rate of 1,481,000 and -3.2% below the April 2024 rate of 1,459,000. Single-family authorizations in April were at a rate of 922,000, -5.1% below the revised March figure of 972,000. Authorizations of units in buildings with five units or more were at a rate of 431,000 in April.
AIA architects still see soft market
The AIA/Deltek Architecture Billings Index (ABI) dropped to 43.2 points in April, down from 44.1 points in March. This decline reflects an accelerated decrease in billing activity.AIA said billings have decreased in 28 out of the past 31 months, following their initial drop into negative territory after the post-pandemic boom. New project inquiries decreased for the third month in a row in April, and the value of new design contracts has declined at the majority of firms for 14 consecutive months.
“Uncertainty as to the economic outlook continues to hold back progress on new construction projects,” said Kermit Baker, AIA’s chief economist, in the press release. “Despite the slowdown in billing activity, architecture firms continue to navigate this business cycle quite effectively, as staffing at firms remains relatively stable and project backlogs are holding up better than expected.”
Freight rail traffic remains strong in early May
For the week ending May 10, total U.S. weekly rail traffic was 495,552 carloads and intermodal units, up +5.7% compared with the same week last year. Total combined U.S. traffic for the first 19 weeks of 2025 was 9,301,159 carloads and intermodal units, an increase of +5.2% compared to last year.
The freight rail traffic categories showed some impressive increases, led by the largest individual categories of them all — intermodal units, which are the shipping containers used to transport products by cargo ship, freight train and truck. Intermodal units were up +7.9%, followed by coal at 6%, grain at 4.9% and farm products, excluding grain at 3%. The only category with a significant decline for the week was Metallic Ores and metals at -4.4%.
