Wholesale Inventories Keep Rising

The U.S. Census Bureau’s reading on wholesale trade in the month of January 2016 showed an increase in inventory levels. This is a trend we have seen confirmed in other economic reports of late, and it was the inventories growth that abnormally increased a fourth-quarter 2016 gross domestic product report.

Sales of merchant wholesalers were listed as $433.1 billion, which is down 1.3% from the revised December level, and were down 3.1% from the January 2015 level. The December preliminary estimate was revised downward $1.0 billion, or 0.2%. January sales of durable goods were down by 1.9% from last month and were down by 3.4% from the prior year’s report.

Sales of computer and computer peripheral equipment and software were down by a sharp 6.4%. The sales of furniture and home furnishings were down by 5.3%. Sales of petroleum and petroleum products were down 6.9% from last month.

Sales of nondurable goods were down by some 0.8% from December and were down 2.8% from last January.

The total inventories of merchant wholesalers were $584.2 billion at the end of January. This was up by 0.3% from the revised December level and up 2.0% from the January 2015 level. That 0.3% gain in the monthly reading compares to a Bloomberg consensus estimate of -0.1%. In short, the growth of inventories continues on the monthly readings — and is even greater if you compare it to a year earlier.
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The December preliminary estimate was revised upward $0.6 billion, or 0.1%. January inventories of durable goods were down 0.3% from last month and down 0.4% from a year ago.

Inventories of electrical and electronic goods were down by some 3.6%, while inventories of motor vehicle and motor vehicle parts and supplies rose by 1.5%

Inventories of nondurable goods were up 1.1% from December and up 5.9% from January of 2015.

Inventories of paper and paper products were up 4.2% from last month, and inventories of drugs and druggists goods rose by 3.3%.

The so-called inventories to sales ratio was 1.35, up from the January 2015 ratio of 1.28.