In the first set of data published by our colleagues at AMT since the “Liberation Day” tariff announcements (and subsequent scaling back a week later), there is an acceleration in growth for the machine tool market in the USA, while demand for cutting tools continues on its steady fall from the peak last May.
The US Manufacturing Technology Orders (USMTO) programme tracks orders in the US market, based on the reports from participants in the survey. Orders in the first four months of 2025 were +18% higher than in the same period of 2024 (January to April). Although the latest figures were lower than in March, that had been an exceptional month, so it is not really valid to suggest that this is the effect of the increased tariffs. You should also bear in mind that this survey tracks orders and, while the boost in March could be partly due to front-loading ahead of tariffs, a large proportion of machine tools are built to order, so would not be delivered until well after the tariffs had taken effect.
Orders from contract machine shops only fell by -6% compared to March – that month is affected by financial year-ends as much as the tariffs – and there was an increase in orders from primary metal manufacturers; the latter could be a positive effect from the tariff announcements as US domestic suppliers look to ramp up supply from limited capacity. The most notable weakness was in aerospace where April orders were nearly half of those in March; however, despite this, they were still above the 2024 monthly average, pointing to an exceptional March rather than a weak April.
The regional picture shows strong year-to-date growth in both the South-Central and Western regions (+42% in both cases), with orders up by +21% in the North-East, +14% in the North-Central-East and a more modest +2% in the North-Central-West area. In the first 4 months of 2025, the only region where orders are lower than the same months of 2024 is the South-East (-2%).
The US Cutting Tool Market Report (CTMR) tracks the market for tooling on a similar basis, although the report confusingly uses both shipments and orders (although the difference matters less for tooling than for machinery). Here, business in the first four months of 2025 was -5% lower than the same period last year (January to April 2024). This is slightly slower than the same comparison in February and March.
The press release highlights the uncertainty created by constant announcement on tariffs ahead of the potentially beneficial effect for US manufacturers, with industries such as aerospace and automotive impacted by a lack of direction for raw materials, inventories and costs of components. There is a clear expectation that the second half of 2025 will be better as these changes settle down.
You can download the press releases for the two surveys from the AMT web-site at https://www.amtonline.org/topic/intelligence, with the CTMR release also published on the USCTI web-site at www.uscti.com (go to the News tab); alternatively, you can request either or both releases from MTA and we can make sure you get them when they are published each month.