2012.06.04 16:00:08 DATA SNAP: US April Factory Orders Decline 0.6%

=================================================== US Factory Orders ! ! Apr Mar ! Consensus: ! Total Orders: -0.6% -2.1%r! Unch ! Ex-Transportation: -1.1% -0.7%r! Actual: ! Durable Goods: Unch r -3.7% ! -0.6% ! =================================================== By Eric Morath and Jeffrey Sparshott WASHINGTON--Demand for U.S. factory goods fell again April to the lowest level in half a year, a worrying sign for a sector that has been a steady source of job creation during the economic recovery. Orders for manufactured goods fell 0.6% in April to $465.98 billion, the Commerce Department said Monday. Economists surveyed by Dow Jones Newswires had expected factory orders to hold steady from the previous month. The drop came on top of a downward revision to March factory orders, which fell 2.1%, compared with a previously reported drop of 1.5%. April's slide came as demand decreased for products such as machinery, cars and computers. Demand for durable goods, products made to last at least three years, was unchanged in April, a downward revision from the 0.2% monthly gain Commerce estimated late last month. Durable goods orders fell 3.7% in March. The factory sector has been an important driver of the recovery. Manufacturing output has averaged a 5.9% growth rate since the recovery began in the third quarter of 2009. "This is markedly more than twice the growth rate of GDP," Cliff Waldman, senior economist for the Manufacturers Alliance, said Friday. "Unfortunately, the weak and risky global economic outlook is a headwind for U.S. factory sector growth." According to the Labor Department's payroll report last week, manufacturing added 12,000 jobs in May. Employment in the sector has expanded by nearly 500,000 since the start of 2010. But the same report suggested the economy as a whole is slowing as monthly job creation reached its lowest level in a year and the unemployment rate increased to 8.2%, the first uptick since June 2011. Monday's factory data showed that orders for transportation-related goods increased 2.2% in April, as rising demand for planes and ships offset a 0.5% decline in auto-related orders. Excluding the often volatile transportation sector, new orders were down 1.1% in April. Defense capital-goods orders--which include such things as communications equipment and aircraft--fell 21.5% in April. Excluding defense orders, overall factory orders were down 0.2%. In April, orders for non-defense capital goods excluding aircraft, a measure of business investment, fell 2.1%. Meanwhile, consumer goods orders increased 0.1% during the month and non-durable goods factory orders fell 1.1% The report showed April factory shipments decreased 0.3%, the largest drop since August. Unfilled orders, a sign of future demand, were 0.1% lower. Inventories were unchanged. The Commerce Department's factory orders report can be found at: http://www.census.gov/manufacturing/m3/. Write to Eric Morath at eric.morath@dowjones.com and Jeffrey Sparshott at jeffrey.sparshott@dowjones.com (END) Dow Jones Newswires June 04, 2012 10:00 ET (14:00 GMT)