The Philadelphia Fed Nonmanufacturing Survey general business activity index was mostly unchanged at -6.0 in December, slightly below the -5.9 in November. New orders saw a sharper decline at -6.1, down from -4.3 previously, and sales were only increasingly by a small margin, dropping from 3.1 to 1.8.

Employment also saw a slower increase with the full-time employee index down -1.9 pts to 3.5, and the part-time employee index down -1.8 pts to 8.9. Despite that, the index tracking compensation costs jumped sharply by 12.7 pts to 43.2 as no firms reported compensation costs falling.

Inflationary pressures were also evident. Both the prices paid and prices received index increased with the former up 8.2 pts to 30.9, and the latter seeing a very large increase of 23.5 pts to 24.0.