The Purchasing Managers’ Index is the earliest monthly read on the economy — a survey of hundreds of firms on output, new orders, hiring and prices, out on the first business day of each month, weeks before the official data. The rule is simple: above 50 means activity is expanding, below 50 means it is shrinking. This tracks the manufacturing and services PMIs month by month. India’s private sector has run above 50 for over four years — even as the pace waxes and wanes. S&P Global / HSBC data.
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Manufacturing & services PMI
What you’re looking at. The PMI is a diffusion index: each month S&P Global asks purchasing managers whether activity is higher, the same, or lower than the month before, and scores the answers so that 50 is the no-change line. A reading of 55 means solidly more firms are growing than shrinking; 48 means the reverse. It is a breadth gauge, not a volume one — it tells you how widespread growth is, not by how much output rose. Because it is survey-based and out first, it leads IIP and GDP by weeks. The manufacturing and services indices are separate surveys; a composite blends the two. Figures are the final (not flash) monthly prints.
Source: S&P Global / HSBC India Manufacturing & Services PMI — monthly, seasonally adjusted, final prints · PolityPolicy · India, in Numbers · by Tushar Gupta
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