The Conference Board’s Leading Economic Index fell 0.2% in June 2026, landing at 99.1 and erasing the modest 0.1% uptick from May.
The LEI is designed to predict turning points in the business cycle roughly seven months out.
What drove the decline
Two culprits stood out in the June report: weakened consumer expectations and a notable decline in building permits. Those are both forward-looking components, which means they carry outsized weight in the index’s predictive value.
On the positive side, the yield spread and certain financial components helped cushion the blow.
