With orders
for transportation equipment showing a substantial decrease, the Commerce
Department released a report on Wednesday showing that new orders for
The report
said durable goods orders tumbled by 5.2 percent in January after jumping by a
revised 3.7 percent in December. Economists had expected orders to fall by 4.0
percent compared to the 4.3 percent increase that had been reported for the
previous month.
Excluding
the sharp drop in orders for transportation equipment, durable goods orders
actually rose by 1.9 percent in January compared to a 1.0 percent increase in
December. Ex-transportation orders had been expected to edge up by 0.2 percent.