"Leading economic indicators refer to those data indicators that can reflect the direction of economic development in advance. They can usually help economic analysts and policymakers predict economic development trends. The changes in these indicators often occur before changes in economic activities, so they are called "Leading" indicators.

Leading economic indicators generally fall into two categories. The first category is stock market and money market data, including stock price indices, interest rates, and exchange rates. These indicators reflect the market's expectations for future economic developments and are often regarded as leading indicators of economic growth. For example, the rise of the stock price index can indicate the market's optimistic expectation of the economic outlook, while the decline of interest rates may indicate that the economy will enter a recovery period.

The second category is real economic data, including indicators such as production, sales, orders and employment. These indicators reflect the changing trend of real economic activity and are often regarded as leading indicators of economic activity. For example, the Manufacturing Purchasing Managers Index (PMI) is an important leading economic indicator that can predict trends in manufacturing production and orders.

Leading economic indicators have a wide range of applications. Governments and central banks can use leading economic indicators to formulate monetary and fiscal policies to ensure economic stability. At the same time, investors and companies can also use leading economic indicators to predict market trends and formulate investment and business strategies, so as to better adapt to market changes.

It should be noted that leading economic indicators cannot predict economic development trends with complete accuracy. Because economic activity is affected by a variety of factors, including political, social and natural factors, these factors may have an impact on the accuracy of leading economic indicators. Therefore, when applying leading economic indicators, it is necessary to comprehensively consider the influence of various factors and conduct analysis in combination with the actual situation. "