BOOM! Big Jump in the Architectural Billing Index!

Despite my love of my favorite economic indicator, the AIA's Architectural Billings Index (ABI), I'm a bit late blogging about it (I blame the World Cup--I've been distracted). What matters is that the figures for May are up sharply to 52.5 from 49.6 in April. The details are below (any value greater than 50 means that architecture billings are increasing; conversely, any value less than 50 means billings are decreasing):

Regional (three month) Averages for May 2014:

• Northeast: 47.6 (up strongly from 42.9 in April but still below 50)
• South: 58.1 (versus 57.5 in April; the South has been strong for a while)
• Midwest: 51.3 (versus 47.0 in April, a strong move to the expansion side of the spectrum)
• West: 46.9 (versus 48.9 in April, the only regional decline)

This is the West's second month of declines, which troubles me. The West has been hot for a while, so we'll see if the declines have legs. Everything is cyclical, and as I've said in the past, there are still regions in the West that are booming (SF/SJ Bay Area, etc.).

Sector Averages for May 2014:

• Multi-family Residential: 58.2 (versus 52.6 in April; this sector has been leading the ABI for some time)
• Commercial/Industrial: 53.6 (versus 50.2 in April, an nice positive move)
• Mixed Practice: 50.4 (versus 50.7 in April)
• Institutional: 47.3 (versus 47.1 in April)

The Inquiry Index is at 63.2 for May, up from 59.1 in April and 57.9 in March. This is correlated to more good news going forward. Hopefully these ABI figures, along with other construction economic indicators, shows the industry is ready to break out.