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The U.S. Census Bureau is updating its economic indicator release calendar in coordination with other agencies and the Office of Management and Budget to address the impacts of the recent lapse in federal funding. We will provide the updated release schedule as soon as it becomes available. For more information, see Census' Recovery Plan for Principal Federal Economic Indicators.

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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: Wednesday, March 11, 2026

Business Formation Statistics

CB26-47



Business Applications
Business Applications for February 2026, adjusted for seasonal variation, were 496,443, a decrease of 5.8 percent compared to January 2026.

Business Formations
Projected Business Formations (within 4 quarters) for February 2026, adjusted for seasonal variation, were 28,994, a decrease of 3.2 percent compared to January 2026. The projected business formations are forward looking, providing an estimate of the number of new business startups that will appear from the cohort of business applications in a given month. It does not provide an estimate of the total number of business startups that appeared within a specific month. In other words, the Census Bureau is projecting that 28,994 new business startups with payroll tax liabilities will form within 4 quarters of application from all the business applications filed during February 2026. The 3.2 percent decrease indicates that for February 2026 there will be 3.2 percent fewer businesses projected to form within 4 quarters of application, compared to the analogous projections for January 2026.

Z = absolute value < 0.05.

The Census Bureau has reviewed the monthly data product to ensure appropriate access, use, and disclosure avoidance protection of the confidential source data (Project No. P-7515311, Disclosure Review Board (DRB) approval number: CBDRB-FY26-0112).

Additional Release Files

Monthly Puerto Rico Business Applications are no longer a separate experimental data product and are part of the Monthly standard data product.

CSV File icon   BFS Time Series   [2.735 MB]
Microsoft Excel icon   BFS Publication Table   [13 KB]
CSV File icon   BFS Month Date Table   [13 KB]

Contact

Data Inquiries
Economic Indicators Division
Business Formation Statistics
301-763-2000
[email protected]

Media Inquiries
Public Information Office
301-763-3030
[email protected]

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