Slice data where it is trending up

[AndyDD_UK]

I'm working on P and L and financial reports.

I have a fact table showing costs by month for each ledger code as well as a date table and other dimension tables.

I'm using measures to show the increase/decrease versus the budget, previous month and last year.

Is there a way to show costs that are trending up for the time period selected (and to not show those that are trending down) ?

Please note that this is a question about trends not variance (one figure compared to another figure).

[AndyDD_UK]

Thanks, for your reply. 

A trend is a pattern found in time series datasets; it is used to describe if the data is showing an upward or downward movement for part or all of the time series. 

To answer your question, data points could go up or down over a time period...eg could go up from month 1 to month 2, and from month 2 to month 3 then go down again...but it's the overall general trend that I'm interested in.

Does that help ? 

Do you have experience in this ? Should the moving average be used to indicate trends to determine as an example that sales for region A are trending up...whereas sales for region B are trending down ?

[lbendlin]

but it's the overall general trend that I'm interested in.

That means you would only need to compare the first and last entry in your time interval.

Now, moving average is an entirely different story.

I am trying to help you formulate what you are actually trying to achieve.

[lbendlin]

What is a trend?  x number of consecutive increases? Is a trend broken when there is a tiny decrease?