According to the latest report from the US Census Bureau, the nation's shipments of manufactured durable goods fell in May for the tenth consecutive month, lengthening what was already a record streak of declines. Following a 0.5% drop in April, shipments in May dropped another 2.1% to $169.9 billion. Meanwhile, unfilled orders and inventories also continued their record declines, with the former decreasing 0.2% to $747.3 billion and the latter falling 0.6% to $513.3 billion. The two measures have fallen for eight and nine consecutive months, respectively.

On the other hand, new durable goods orders increased for the third time in four months, rising 1.8% to $163.9 billion. They increased by the same percentage in April. In addition, orders for nondurable manufactured goods increased 0.7% in May to $184.5 billion, while shipments of petroleum and coal products rose 8.3% $2.5 to $32.3 billion. Some analysts believe the boost in new orders and surge in energy shipments indicate the economy may have bottomed out and begun to move upward.

Freight rail traffic also fell in May, according to the Association of American Railroads. US rail carload traffic fell 24.7% to 989,306 carloads compared to May 2008, while US rail intermodal traffic fell 19.7% to 723,898 units. Canadian rail carload traffic (which includes both the Canadian and US operations of CN and Canadian Pacific) fell 32.8% in May to 213,517 carloads, while Canadian intermodal traffic fell 18.1% to 157,446 trailers and containers.