What does negative surprise mean? I have a look at the meaning of &quot;negative surprise&quot; from google but there is no clear explanation so far.
When listening to Bloomberg Market Concept, in the picture, Surv(M) &lt; Actual,
while  Surv(M) is the median of analysts about what the value of economic indicator would be upon release and the Actual is the one from the official announcement. In this case, they say that it is a negative surprise.
I am wondering why they use the word &quot;negative surprise&quot; and whether there is any easy-to-understand explanation for this term in real life?
(This is an English language question, not an economic one. Next time consider asking at English Language &amp; Usage.)
A surprise is negative, if it is a bad surprise (for someone). In this context they probably mean that the revealed value of the indicator (PMI) is lower than they expected, which shows that the economy is in worse shape than they expected.
(For different indicators, such as the unemployment rate, it could be that the negative surprise is a higher than expected value.)