“Planes Off the Radar”: June’s Factory‑Order Crash in Context

The headline numbers look jarring: after an 8.3 % surge in May, U.S. factory orders fell 4.8 % in June—the steepest one‑month drop since the dark days of April 2020.

Behind that swing lurk wildly volatile transportation bookings (planes, ships, railcars) and the first real signs that companies are trimming the “just‑in‑case” inventories they built up during tarif…