Business Formation Statistics

Announcements

• Notice: Due to quality concerns, combined weeks 52 and 53 data will be released on January 7, 2021. Data for week 52 in the files will include applications for both week 52 and week 53.
• Notice: After the BFS release of 2020 week 53 on January 7, 2021 and 2020 Q4 on January 14, 2021, BFS reports will no longer be released on a weekly or quarterly basis. Starting with January 2021 data, available February 10, 2021, reports will be released monthly. The Census Bureau will continue to produce weekly estimates; however, the weekly estimates will be issued in the new monthly release. The Census Bureau will continue to evaluate the feasibility of producing weekly estimates and provide future notice regarding the continuation of this series.
• Notice: Starting with week 27 of the weekly Business Application releases and 2020 Q2 of the quarterly Business Formation Statistics releases, the BFS data will incorporate updated North American Industry Classification System (NAICS) codes for some EIN applications. The Census Bureau periodically receives updated NAICS code information for EIN applications from administrative sources and updates are applied to the BFS data. Changes to application counts may be observed when comparing to data that was published in previous periods.
• Notice: Business Formation Statistics series are updated annually to revise information on business formations (firm births). While the annual update is typically done in the 3rd quarter of each year, this year's annual update is planned for sometime in 2020 to accommodate the ongoing modernization of the methodology for the Business Dynamic Statistics (BDS) program that generates data on business formations.
• Notice: On May 13, 2019, the IRS implemented a change in Form SS-4 requiring a social security number (SSN) or an individual taxpayer identification number (ITIN) for the responsible party indicated in the EIN application. The change will prevent entities using their existing EINs to apply for additional EINs. Please click here for more information on the requirement change. The form field that the change applies to is not one that the Census Bureau receives and it is not used in the analysis. As a result, we cannot necessarily draw any conclusions on the impact of this change on the BFS.
• New: Beginning with the release of the 2nd quarter 2019 statistics on July 17, 2019, the format and location of the Business Formation Statistics (BFS) has changed. The BFS was first released as a research product in the Census Bureau's Center for Ecomomic Studies in February 2018. The BFS has been redesigned into a formal release to include accompanying visualizations to highlight important trends in the data, and now has a new home among the monthly and quarterly economic indicators released by the Census Bureau.
• FRED Mobile App: Receive the latest updates on the nation's key economic indicators by downloading the FRED App for both Apple and Android devices. FRED, the signature database of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, now incorporates the Census Bureau's 13 economic indicators.
• API: The URL for the economic indicators data in the Census Bureau API (Application Programming Interface ) has been updated to add /timeseries/. Examples can be found on the Developers' webpage.

Release Schedule

The Upcoming Release Dates are below:

• The Quarterly BFS Report (Fourth Quarter 2020) released January 14, 2021 at 10:00 a.m.
• The Monthly BFS Report (January 2021) releases February 10, 2021 at 10:00 a.m.
• Click here to access the 2021 Release Schedule.

Contact Us

Business Formation Statistics Staff: