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Economy in Brief
Italian Consumer Confidence Remains Hammered Down
Italy's consumer confidence fell month-to-month...
U.S. Current Account Deficit Deepens to Record in Q1'22
The U.S. current account deficit deepened to $291.4 billion during Q1'22...
Kansas City Fed Manufacturing Index Declines Further in June But Remains Positive
The Kansas City Fed reported that its manufacturing sector business activity index fell to 12 in June...
U.S. Unemployment Claims Edged Down
Initial claims for unemployment insurance filed in the week ended June 18 declined by 2,000 to 229,000...
U.S. Energy Prices Reverse Earlier Gains
Retail gasoline prices surged to $5.01 per gallon (63.1% y/y)...
Viewpoints
Commentaries are the opinions of the author and do not reflect the views of Haver Analytics.
by Tom Moeller July 16, 2019
Total business inventories rose 0.3% (5.3% y/y) during May following an unrevised 0.5% April gain. Total business sales rose 0.2% (1.5% y/y) following an unrevised 0.2% decline. The inventory-to-sales (I/S) ratio held steady at an unrevised 1.39. Business inventory swings can have a meaningful impact on GDP. In 1Q'19 inventories added 0.6 percentage point to GDP growth following a 0.1 point addition to 4Q'18 growth.
Retail inventories increased 0.4% (4.7% y/y) in May after rising 0.6% during April. Auto inventories, which comprise roughly 35% of retail inventories, grew 0.7% (7.7% y/y). Non-auto retail inventories rose 0.3% (3.0% y/y). General merchandise inventories, the second largest sector fell 0.4% (-0.0% y/y). Department store inventories, a subset of general merchandise, moved 0.3% lower (-8.4% y/y) as clothing & accessory store inventories ticked 0.1% higher (0.8% y/y). Factory sector inventories gained 0.2% (3.6% y/y). As reported last week, wholesale inventories rose 0.4% (7.7% y/y).
Retail sales increased 0.3% in May (2.7% y/y, with non-auto sales growing 0.2% (2.6% y/y). Wholesale sector sales edged 0.1% higher (0.4% y/y), while shipments from the factory sector also rose 0.1% (1.4% y/y).
The inventory-to-sales ratio in the retail sector was unchanged at 1.46. The non-auto I/S ratio also was stable at 1.20, above the historic low of 1.17 reached in November 2018 (data goes back to 1967). The wholesale and factory sector I/S ratios edged up to 1.35 and 1.38 respectively.
The manufacturing and trade data are in Haver's USECON database.
Manufacturing & Trade | May | Apr | Mar | May Y/Y | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Business Inventories (% chg) | 0.3 | 0.5 | 0.0 | 5.3 | 4.9 | 3.4 | 1.7 |
Retail | 0.4 | 0.6 | -0.4 | 4.7 | 4.2 | 2.4 | 4.0 |
Retail excl. Motor Vehicles | 0.3 | 0.5 | -0.2 | 3.0 | 1.7 | 2.0 | 2.0 |
Merchant Wholesalers | 0.4 | 0.8 | -0.0 | 7.7 | 7.1 | 3.3 | 1.9 |
Manufacturing | 0.2 | 0.2 | 0.4 | 3.6 | 3.5 | 4.5 | -0.7 |
Business Sales (% chg) | |||||||
Total | 0.2 | -0.2 | 1.3 | 1.5 | 6.1 | 5.4 | -0.8 |
Retail | 0.3 | 0.3 | 2.0 | 2.7 | 4.6 | 4.5 | 2.4 |
Retail excl. Motor Vehicles | 0.2 | 0.5 | 1.5 | 2.6 | 5.3 | 4.8 | 1.9 |
Merchant Wholesalers | 0.1 | -0.4 | 1.8 | 0.4 | 6.5 | 6.7 | -1.3 |
Manufacturing | 0.1 | -0.6 | 0.2 | 1.4 | 6.9 | 5.0 | -3.2 |
I/S Ratio | |||||||
Total | 1.39 | 1.39 | 1.38 | 1.34 | 1.36 | 1.38 | 1.42 |
Retail | 1.46 | 1.46 | 1.46 | 1.44 | 1.45 | 1.47 | 1.49 |
Retail excl. Motor Vehicles | 1.20 | 1.20 | 1.20 | 1.19 | 1.20 | 1.24 | 1.28 |
Merchant Wholesalers | 1.35 | 1.34 | 1.33 | 1.26 | 1.29 | 1.30 | 1.35 |
Manufacturing | 1.38 | 1.37 | 1.36 | 1.35 | 1.35 | 1.37 | 1.41 |