--US April factory orders -3.0%; ex-transportation -1.7%
--Excluding defense, US April factory orders -2.5%
--US April durable goods orders unrevised at -5.0%
--US April factory inventories +0.1%; shipments -2.5%
--US April unfilled orders -0.3%
--US April's inventory/shipments ratio 1.42 vs March's 1.38

By Andrew Williams
Washington, June 5 (BridgeNews) - Widespread declines pushed U.S. factory orders down 3.0% in April, an even steeper drop than the 2.7% decrease forecast by private analysts. Excluding transportation, factory orders fell 1.7% in April, while factory inventories inched up 0.1%. The report is the latest evidence that the manufacturing sector continues to sag.
* * * It was the first drop in factory orders since January and followed a revised 0.7% increase in March, last reported up 1.8%.
April's non-durable goods orders, being reported for the first time Tuesday, were down 0.5% after a revised 0.8% drop the month before, the Commerce Department said.
April's orders for durable goods fell 5.0%, unrevised from the May 25 preliminary report on durable goods (see story .4726).
This is the first release of this report since Commerce unveiled a new method of measuring the activity of the nation's retailers and manufacturers.
Retail, wholesale trade and factory orders data back to 1992 have been revised under the new system.
The new method includes 79 new industries and introduces a new subsection to monitor the activities of computer and electronic producers.
WHAT WAS EXPECTED:
In a BridgeNews survey, private analysts forecast April factory orders would be reported in a range of down 3.0% to up 0.2%.
FACTORY INVENTORIES, SHIPMENTS:
--The April rise of 0.1% in manufacturers' inventories followed a revised 0.8% decline in March.
--Factory shipments continued to decline in April, dropping 2.5%, following a revised 0.1% decline in March.
--The inventory-to-shipments ratio rose to 1.42 in April, from March's 1.38, and the highest since July 1998, a Commerce official said. --Unfilled orders fell 0.3% in April, after being unchanged in March.
CAPITAL GOODS SHIPMENTS:
Shipments of non-defense capital goods, excluding aircraft, fell a revised 3.4% in April after being reported down 4.7% in the durable goods report. These shipments are an important indicator of trends in capital spending and the contribution of producers' durable equipment purchases to GDP growth.
ORDERS DETAILS:
In other revisions to the April durables data, Commerce said transportation equipment orders tumbled 9.6%, previously reported as down 9.3%.
Orders for electronic and other electric equipment were revised to down 10.3%; they were previously reported down 8.8%. Orders for semiconductors plunged 34.8%, previously reported down 31.9%; communications equipment fell 4.7%, last reported down 3.3%. Orders for industrial machinery fell an unrevised 2.8%.
In one of the few areas of strength in the durable goods sector, orders for power generating equipment rose 16.5%. And in non-durables, orders for tobacco rose 3.6% and petroleum and coal products climbed 3.8%.