U.S. durable goods orders to their lowest pace in four months, due to declining aircraft sales. Oil Sales also were low, official data showed on Nov. 22.
Orders for civilian aircraft fell 18.6% and defense aircraft were down 11.3%.
Sales of cars and light trucks, which have struggled to keep pace this year after a record 2016, rose 1.7% for the month. Sales of metals and computers gained slighlty.
But excluding the highly volatile transportation sector, which sees big swings from month to month, orders had their fourth straight monthly increase, gaining 0.4% on rising sales of communications equipment, electrical appliances, machinery and primary metals.
Non-defense capital goods, which can reflect the needs of oil producers and refiners and change with the price of oil, saw their biggest drop in more than a year, falling 0.5%.
The result could point to more modest GDP growth in the final quarter of 2017.
Total orders for big-ticket manufactured goods fell 1.2% for the month to $236 billion, according to the Commerce Department.
The result surprised economists, who had instead been expecting a 0.4% increase.
So far in 2017, orders are up 4.9% over the same period last year.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2017
