The Conference Board announced today that the U.S. leading index decreased 0.1 percent, the coincident index increased 0.2 percent and the lagging index increased 0.3 percent in April.

Three of the ten indicators that make up the leading index increased in April. The positive contributors were vendor performance, stock prices, and interest rate spread. The negative contributors were building permits, manufacturers' new orders for non-defense capital goods, index of consumer expectations, average weekly initial claims for unemployment insurance (inverted), real money supply, and manufacturers' new orders for consumer goods and materials. The average weekly manufacturing hours held steady in April.