Employees work on Boeing 737 MAX airplanes at the Boeing Renton Factory in Renton, Washington on March 27, 2019
AFP

New orders for manufactured durable goods decreased $6.3 billion or 2.2 percent in December.

The consensus expectation before the release on Tuesday morning was a 0.2 percent increase.

Orders have been down four of the last five months and sat at an estimated $276.1 billion in December, the U.S. Census Bureau announced.

There was a 2.0 decrease in November.

The numbers were skewed by problems at Boeing. A strike at two factories in Washington halted production for nearly two months and impacted deliveries at the end of the year.

Transportation equipment drove the decrease in durable orders, down $6.9 billion or 7.4 percent to $86.1 billion.

Excluding transportation, new orders increased 0.3 percent.