A note on the recent "blockbuster" US ISM Manufacturing PMI numbers and the fallacy of their interpretation;
The ISM figures are diffusion indices calculated by the percentage of respondents expecting the future to improve minus the percentage expecting the future to worsen.
After an economy has been totally shut down and if every respondent thought things would get even a little better after the reopening, then the ISMs would register 100% - the maximum.
Obviously, currently this is nowhere near the case.
E.g. those recent, much celebrated "blockbuster numbers (in the low 60s)" are nothing more than a clear indication of just how bad things really are out there!