By Xavier Fontdegloria

Economic growth in the U.S. moderated in August, adding to signs of a slowdown in activity, data from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago showed Monday.

The Chicago Fed National Activity Index fell to zero in August from a revised 0.29 in July, suggesting the economy expanded at its historical average growth pace.

The CFNAI index, designed to gauge overall economic activity and inflationary pressures, is composed of 85 economic indicators from four broad categories of data: production and income; employment, unemployment and hours; personal consumption and housing; and sales, orders and inventories.

The index's monthly decline in August was driven by production-related indicators, whose losses offset gains from the other components.

Production-related indicators contributed by minus 0.08 to the index as industrial production declined 0.2% on month, the report said.

Employment-related indicators contributed 0.03 to the index in August, less than 0.12 the previous month, as the unemployment rate increased to 3.7% and payroll growth slowed.

The contribution of the sales, orders and inventories category to the index fell to 0.01 in August from 0.03 in the previous month, while the personal consumption and housing category contributed by 0.05 from 0.01 in July.

The CFNAI diffusion index increased to 0.11 in August from 0.01 in July, while the index's three-month moving average, the CFNAI-MA3, rose to 0.01 from minus 0.08.

Both indicators signal that the U.S. economy continued to expand in the three months to August as the indexes are above the minus 0.35 and minus 0.70 values that, respectively, have been associated with periods of economic growth.

Write to Xavier Fontdegloria at xavier.fontdegloria@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

September 26, 2022 08:44 ET (12:44 GMT)