FedEx: Summer manufacturing activity to be "substantially negative", with growing concern over fuel

As valuable forward indicators of business activity, the small package and printing operations of FedEx are usually reliable, so the fact that results were worse than analysts expected did nothing to excite a cautious market this week. FedEx stock had been sinking in recent days, apparently in anticipation of a weak result. It has fallen nearly a fifth in value since reaching its recent peak in early May-2009 - and most of that loss occurred in the past week.