Ceridian-UCLA Pulse of Commerce Index PCI

The Ceridian-UCLA PCI tracks the volume and location of diesel fuel being purchased. The index monitors the over the road movement of raw materials, goods-in-process and finished goods to United States factories, retailers and consumers. The index closely tracks to the Federal Reserve’s Industrial Production Index.

The index was created by economists at the UCLA Anderson School of Management and Charles River Associates.

The data for calculating this index is collected through Ceridian’s electronic card payment services for transportation industries. Every day across the United States, over the road trucks are fueling up with diesel as they move goods across the country, delivering everything from produce to raw materials to finished goods.

Ceridian tracks and analyzes the volume of fuel being used by these vehicles on a yearly, monthly, weekly and daily basis. Ceridian processes millions of fuel transactions each year, and this data is used to calculate the index.

Every time an over the road truck makes a diesel fuel purchase using a Ceridian card, Ceridian’s database captures the location and number of gallons pumped into the tank. Each transaction acts like a sensor providing data to Ceridian. The data is then analyzed to provide a detailed picture of over the road trucking activity along U.S. interstates and at cities, shipping ports, manufacturing centers and border crossings with Canada and Mexico.

The index is publically released monthly prior to the release of the Federal Reserve’s Industrial Production numbers which is generally on or near the 10th day of each month.