With increases in wholesale and retail inventories more than offsetting a modest drop in manufacturing inventories, the Commerce Department released a report on Monday showing U.S. business inventories rose in line with economist estimates in the month of August.
The Commerce Department said business inventories rose by 0.5 percent in August after climbing by an upwardly revised 0.7 percent in July.
Economists had expected inventories to rise by 0.5 percent compared to the 0.6 percent increase originally reported for the previous month.
The report said wholesale and retail inventories jumped by 1.0 percent and 0.7 percent, respectively, while manufacturing inventories edged down by 0.1 percent.
Meanwhile, the Commerce Department said wholesale sales climbed by 0.5 percent in August after edging up by 0.2 percent in July.
While retail sales came in unchanged, manufacturing and wholesale sales rose by 0.5 percent and 0.8 percent, respectively.
With inventories and sales rising at the same rate, the total business inventories/sales ratio in August came in unchanged from the previous month at 1.34.
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