An early estimate of the Services Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) for a country, designed to provide an accurate advance indication of the final Services PMI data. As the flash PMIs are among the first economic indicators for each month, providing evidence of changing economic conditions ahead of comparable government statistics, they can have a significant effect on currency markets. 

Service PMIs are published monthly by Markit Economics in conjunction with sponsors, and are based on surveys of over 400 executives in private sector service companies. The surveys cover transport and communication, financial intermediaries, business and personal services, computing & IT and hotels and restaurants.

As each response received is weighted by the size of the company, responses from larger companies have a greater impact on the final index numbers than replies from smaller companies. An index level of 50 denotes no change since the previous month, while a level above 50 signals an increase or improvement, and below 50 indicates a decrease or deterioration.