File: Wholesale trade sales and inventories. (Photo: Bureau of Labor Statistics/ BLS)
The U.S. Census Bureau said Monday preliminary readings on wholesale inventories (up) and retail inventories (down) essentially offset each other out. Whole inventories rose 0.4% to $601.2 billion in July, a solid number for third-quarter (3Q) gross domestic product (GDP), and are up 3.1% (±0.7 percent) from July 2016.
The percentage change from May 2017 to June 2017 was revised from up 0.7% (±0.4 percent) to up 0.6% (±0.4 percent).
They slightly more than offset a preliminary 0.2% drop in retail inventories to $619.6 billion after they rose strongly in June to give a late boost to second-quarter (2Q) GDP. Initial readings also showed 2Q weakness but were revised higher.
Retail inventories were up 3.3% (±0.5 percent) from July 2016 and the percentage change from May 2017 to June 2017 was unrevised at up 0.6% (±0.2 percent).
Still, the Atlanta Federal Reserve on Friday revised its GDPNow Forecast for the 3Q to 3.4%, down from 3.8% on August 16. The next GDPNow update including the latest data is due on Thursday, August 31.
