If you were looking for a dovish macro print to support any “last hike” hopes you may be harboring for the Fed, America’s marquee factory survey obliged on Monday.

At 46.3, ISM manufacturing missed estimates. The range was 45.7 to 48.5 from more than five-dozen economists.

It was the lowest headline print since May of 2020, and considered with recent gains for US equities, stocks look disconnected.

As ever, I’d caution against reading too much into that visual — it’s apples to oranges, but it’s entertaining.

In addition to the headline index, gauges for new orders, production, employment, inventories, backlogs and new export orders are all in contraction. The new orders print was a lackluster 44.3. “New order rates remain sluggish as panelists become more concerned about when manufacturing growth will resume,” ISM chair Timothy Fiore said Monday, adding that “supply chains are now ready for growth.”

The anecdotes from panelists weren’t any semblance of dire, though. Frankly, I’d suggest some of them belied the ostensibly depressing prints on key gauges.

Notably, the prices paid index slipped back below the 50 demarcation line in March. That was good news given the extent to which the Fed is depending on goods prices to remain well-behaved in the face of stubborn services sector inflation.

I’d be remiss not to at least mention that OPEC+ is trying to engineer higher oil which, if successful, could eventually feed through to input prices.

Meanwhile, S&P Global’s manufacturing gauge for the US economy was basically unchanged from March’s flash print. It paints a slightly more encouraging picture on the growth side compared to ISM, even as the color accompanying the release described “concerning trends.”

Apparently, increased production in March was attributable largely to an anomalous abatement of supply chain pressures. “The timely delivery of inputs allowed firms to work through backlogs, but sparse demand amid pressure on customer spending due to higher interest rates and inflation spoke to challenges ahead for goods producers if there is little change in domestic and international client appetite,” Sian Jones, Senior Economist at S&P Global Market Intelligence, said.

Lead times improved the most on record in the S&P survey. ISM’s supplier deliveries gauge indicated the fastest performance since March of 2009, when the S&P bottomed during the GFC.

Jones flagged a “paucity” of new orders, which engendered lower selling price pressures. Of course, that means lower margins, which is a drag on sentiment.

Both surveys have been in contraction territory since late last year.

All in all, the PMIs suggested a hobbled manufacturing sector struggling with weaker demand. This is, arguably, the “good” kind of contraction, though. The silver lining is that inflation pressures on the factory side appear mostly under control.

As for hiring, it’s basically a stalemate. As Fiore put it, “companies are attempting to maintain workforce levels to support projected second-half growth,” but ISM’s employment index nevertheless fell to 46.9 in March, the lowest since July of 2020.