WASHINGTON — The value of business inventories in February was up 0.3% from January, as expected by both an MNI survey and the Bloomberg consensus, data released by the Commerce Department Thursday morning showed.
Retail inventories posted 0.3% gain, while the wholesale inventories report showed a 0.2% increase in the month, and factory inventories were already reported to be up 0.3%.
According to an MNI calculation, if a 0.3% increase in motor vehicle inventories had been excluded, total business inventories would have been up 0.3% in February.
After excluding the increase in motor vehicle inventories, the remaining retail categories were up 0.3%. All of the other retail inventory components were generally up in February.
At the same time, the relatively large unpublished retail category rose 0.8% following a 0.7% increase in January, according to an MNI calculation.
February business sales posted a 0.1% increase in the month, and retail sales excluding food services were down 0.3% in February. There was a previously announced 0.4% increase for factory shipments, which are equal to sales in this report, and wholesale sales posted a 0.3% gain.
The inventory-to-sales ratio was unchanged in February from 1.39 in January due to comparable growth in inventories compared to sales in February. The ratio was up from the 1.36 level seen in February 2018, as inventory growth has slightly outpaced sales growth over the last year.
