recession fears, page-14

Futures currently 189 points up, but that might quickly change when this report is picked up on...

BUSH

U.S. Industrial Output Fell 2.8% in September, Most Since 1974
By Shobhana Chandra

Oct. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Industrial production in the U.S. fell in September by the most in almost 34 years as hurricanes and an aircraft strike combined with the credit crunch to weaken manufacturing.

The 2.8 percent decrease in production at factories, mines and utilities exceeded forecasts and followed a revised 1 percent decrease in August, the Federal Reserve said today. Capacity utilization, which measures the proportion of plants in use, fell to 76.4 percent from 78.7 percent the prior month.

Last month's Gulf Coast hurricanes accounted for 2.25 percentage points of the decline in industrial production, which was the biggest drop since December 1974, the report showed. Frozen credit markets and higher borrowing costs will force consumers and companies to further trim purchases of expensive items such as cars and machinery.

``Industrial production is in free fall,'' Ellen Zentner, a senior U.S. economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York, said before the report. ``The U.S. is in a recession and other industrial nations are teetering on the edge of one. We've marked down our estimates for exports.''