Ivey PMI s.a

What is Ivey PMI s.a.?

The Ivey Purchasing Managers Index (Ivey PMI) is a monthly survey of purchasing managers across Canada run by Ivey Business School at Western University. It measures month-to-month variation in economic activity across the full economy, including public and private sectors, from month-end data collected monthly since December 2000. The headline, labelled s.a. for seasonally adjusted, reflects 1 question only: whether dollar purchases were higher, same, or lower than the previous month. It also has 4 parallel gauges published alongside, together called the Ivey Indices, covering employment, unit inventories, delivery speed, and prices separately.

When is it released and what happens each release?

Responses compare the month just ended with the previous month, so the index reflects end-of-month change rather than mid-month conditions. Ivey releases it on its website on the 3rd or 4th working day of each month at 10:00 a.m. Eastern Standard Time. Each release shows the adjusted headline with unadjusted results and 4 companion indices: above 50 is rise, 50 is flat, below 50 is fall. Question wording, year-ago comparisons, and a director comment come with each release, with 24 months of data online and no stated revision rule.

What moves Ivey PMI s.a.?

The headline tracks purchases only, so its companions explain breadth rather than weighting the headline. Panellists are selected by location and sector to mirror the economy, with no stated panel size.

• Purchases: whether organizations spent more, the same, or fewer dollars than the previous month.
• Employment: whether employment levels were higher, same, or lower than the previous month.
• Inventories: whether purchased inventories in units, spanning raw, MRO, and intermediate but not finished goods unless bought, were higher, same, or lower than the previous month.
• Supplier Deliveries: whether the average pace of deliveries was faster, same, or slower than the previous month, under the same formula with no inversion.
• Prices: whether average weighted prices paid for requirements were higher, same, or lower than the previous month.

April 2020 showed how companions can diverge, with the adjusted headline at 22.8, a record low, alongside Employment at 22.9 and Deliveries at 18.2. The March 2020 reading was 26.0, against 55.9 in April 2019. Inventories held at 34.5 while Prices stayed above 50 at 51.2, so input costs rose on balance even as purchases collapsed. The index then rose to 39.1 in May 2020, still below 50 and thus still shrinking, showing the index tracks monthly direction, not output levels.

How is Ivey PMI s.a. calculated?

1. Shares: sort answers into higher (H), same (S), and lower (L) shares that sum to 100%.
2. Gap: subtract the lower share from the higher share to get D, so D equals H minus L in points.
3. Halve the gap: divide D by 2; for example, H at 26% and L at 12% gives D of 14 and half of 7.
4. Add to 50: compute 50 plus D divided by 2 on a 0 to 100 scale, so 26% higher and 12% lower gives 57. Equal shares of 20% give 50, while 10% higher and 19% lower give 45.5. An illustration with 30% higher, 50% same, and 20% lower gives D of 10 and an index of 55.
5. Seasonal adjustment: remove regular seasonal patterns with the U.S. Census Bureau X12-ARIMA program to compare consecutive months; Ivey publishes adjusted and unadjusted readings.

Key point: The headline is not a weighted mix and not manufacturing only. It is 1 dollar-purchases question across the full public and private economy, with 4 companions never blended in.