Confidence among equipment managers continues to be middle of the road, with the Equipment Manager Confidence Index, published by Construction Equipment, holding steady for the third consecutive month. The October 1 index was 109, effectively unchanged from the 108 reported on September 1. The August 1 Index had dipped to 104; July 1 was 107. The Index measures equipment manager confidence on a scale of 0 to 200, with 200 indicating full confidence that the next month will be “better.”
The Index gauges the sentiment among construction equipment users who provide opinions on confidence as well as other asset-management topics in exchange for free access to the group’s insights in a secure intelligence software platform. Participation in the Index is free for those who manage fleets of construction equipment. Interested? Sign up here.
“It’s no surprise, really, that confidence has settled at this point,” says Rod Sutton, editorial director. “The lack of movement in either direction indicates nothing has happened to change outlooks. Although the Index was calculated just before President Trump announced he had contracted Covid-19, confidence has shown no signs of moving one way or the other.
“We suspect the level of uncertainty fueled by the coronavirus pandemic and upcoming national election is hampering everyone’s willingness to look too far out,” Sutton says.
The Equipment Management Confidence Index is published and available to the entire industry at ConstructionEquipment.com/EMCI. Other numerical trends are available only to members of the Index group. For example, the Index shows that construction fleet health has declined since last year. As in past recessions, and most notably as Tier 4-F machines hit the market several years ago, managers appear to be keeping equipment longer. The effects of such moves will play out in coming months as managers make maintenance and acquisition decisions.
Additional insights available to members:
- Overall economy health
- Current fleet health: now v. last year
- Future fleet health: now v. next year
- Equipment acquisition: better or worse to buy new
- Equipment disposition: better or worse time to sell used
- External rental: better or worse time to rent
- Peer to peer rental: better or worse time to generate revenue
- Planned maintenance: spend more or less than last year
- Rebuilds: more or less likely than last year
In addition to the Confidence Index, members of the platform also provide opinions on trends within asset management, including acquisition expectations, rental plans, and maintenance. In June, for example, the index showed that managers are not looking at the next few weeks as a better time to rent equipment. With the free access, managers can see how the trend is unfolding and compare themselves to others in the platform.
Equipment end users can have access to these insights for free. Others, such as manufacturers or dealers, may gain access to the data as observers by registering here. The next Index computation occurs at the end of the month. Equipment managers can join the group anytime this month in order to provide opinions and access month-over-month trends. Baromitr’s visualization features also allow members to analyze performance and compare how they are doing relative to others in the group.
The data-driven Index is powered by Baromitr, a scalable, peer-benchmarking platform. The Equipment Manager Confidence Index is a custom algorithm that combines multiple inputs to calculate a score from 0 to 200. The higher it is, the more confident equipment managers are.
