Washington, DC, July 15--Industrial production rose 0.9% in June, according to the Federal Reserve. It was the strongest monthly increase since February 2004.
Capacity utilization rose to 80% from 79.4% reaching its highest level since December 2000. The gains were much larger than forecast.
Economists were expecting production to rise 0.4% and capacity utilization to rise to 76.4%. Despite the large increase in June, production was up only 2.1% annualized in the second quarter.
This is the slowest quarterly pace since the second quarter of 2003. Manufacturing output rose 0.4% in June. Output of utilities jumped 5.3%. Mining output rose 0.4%
