May 2010 Wholesale Trade Sales & Inventories was released today. Wholesale sales dropped -0.3% from last month. Last month sales were a revised +0.9% change from March. This is the first decline in sales in 14 months.
Lumber and Farm products has the largest sales declines. Non-durable goods declined -1.0% from April as a whole, durable goods was +0.5% increase from April 2010.
April 2010 Wholesale Trade Sales & Inventories was released today. Seasonally adjusted sales were up 0.7% from last month. Inventories were up 0.4% from last month. For the year, sales have increased 16.3% and inventories have decreased 3.2%. Seasonally adjusted durable sales was up 2.0% while non-durable sales was down -0.4%. Inventories for durable were up 0.3% while non-durable was 0.7%.
February 2010 sales of merchant wholesalers were $338.7 billion, up 0.8 percent (+/-0.7%) from last month. End-of-month inventories were $393.5 billion, up 0.6 percent (+/-0.5%) from last month.
The monthly Wholesale Trade: Sales & Inventories for December 2009 is out and we have even more inventory slashing. Recall a major factor in Q4 2009 GDP was inventory restocking, so more evidence Q4 2009 GDP is a fleeting blip.
Sales were up 2.0% from October 2009 and Inventories were up 0.4% from October 2009.
For the year to year comparison, sales are still down 0.4% from November 2008 and inventories were down 11.1% from November 2008. Remember in November 2008 the official recession has gone on for 11 months.
Sales to inventory ratios is now 1.28 for the month. This is actually good, yet don't get your panties all in a bunch until you read the below on wholesale data, released earlier in the week.
The more the inventory/sales ratio returns to pre-recession levels the more it is implied hiring will begin to manufacture new goods. Of course that also requires demand return to pre-recession levels.
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