The Daily Build: Dodge Starts Hit 3-Year High; Highways Return to Growth

Research evidence excerpt

The Daily Build: Dodge Starts Hit 3-Year High; Highways Return to Growth

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17 Jun 2026 07:03:07 ET │ 12 pages

The Daily Build

Dodge Starts Hit 3-Year High; Highways Return to Growth

CITI'S TAKE

Anthony Pettinari AC

In our daily, we highlight items of interest for Homebuilders, Building +1-212-816-4693

Products & Construction Materials investors: anthony.pettinari@citi.com

Bryan BurgmeierHomebuilders & Building Products outperformed yesterday (+1.0% vs S&P -0.6%) as

easing Middle East tensions and falling crude prices offset softer housing starts & bryan.burgmeier@citi.com

mixed ABC contractor confidence data (see below for detail). Today we’ll listen for Landry Moorecommentary from Fed Chair Warsh at his first FOMC meeting; Citi Econ sees a

pathway for a more dovish outlook in 2H ’26. landry.moore@citi.com

LTM Dodge construction starts data released late yesterday accelerated to +12.4%

Y/Y in May (vs +8.0% in April), with strength in non-building and non-res offsetting

weaker resi; acceleration was led by the Energy sector, with Power Plants up +122%

Y/Y. LTM Highway starts accelerated M/M, and are now more in-line with the 2025

avg. (+4% in May vs +5% 2025 avg.); Water starts saw a softer trend, remaining flat

at +6% Y/Y in May (and still below the +12% 2025 avg.). Total Y/Y growth accelerated

to a 3-year high in May and now sits modestly above the 2025 avg. (~6%); we

highlight takeaways herein.

Non-res construction backlogs ticked up +0.3 M/M in May to 9.1 months, the 5th

straight month of consecutive growth, per data out yesterday from Associated

Builders and Contractors (ABC). Among the 3 sector sub-indexes, a slight decline in

Commercial & Institutional (-0.1 M/M) was offset by gains in Industrial (+0.9) and

Infrastructure (+0.2).