Econintersect‘s analysis of final business sales data (retail plus wholesale plus manufacturing) for May 2014 shows sales decelerated with inventory levels up – however, the inventory levels were within the normal range for periods of expansion. The headlines disagreed saying both sales and inventories rate of growth improved.
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- The unadjusted three month rolling average of business sales growth continues to accelerate.
- This is a record current dollar month for sales.
Econintersect Analysis:
- unadjusted sales rate of growth decelerated 2.4% month-over-month, and up 3.3% year-over-year
- unadjusted sales (inflation adjusted) up 1.0% year-over-year
- unadjusted sales three month rolling average compared to the rolling average 1 year ago accelerated 0.4% month-over-month, and is up 4.3% year-over-year.
- unadjusted business inventories growth accelerated 0.6% month-over-month (up5.7% year-over-year), and the inventory-to-sales ratio is 1.25 which is slightly above average for Mays during non-recessionary periods.
US Census Headlines:
- seasonally adjusted sales up 0.4% month-over-month, up 4.6% year-over-year
- seasonally adjusted inventories up 0.5% month-over-month (up 5.6% year-over-year), inventory-to-sales ratios were up from 1.28 one year ago – and are now 1.29.
- market expectations were not available.
The way data is released, differences between the business releases pumped out by the U.S. Census Bureau are not easy to understand with a quick reading. The entire story does not come together until the Business Sales Report (this report) comes out. At this point, a coherent and complete business contribution to the economy can be understood.
Today, Econintersect analyzed advance retail sales for June 2014. That is early data for the month following the data for this post. This is final data from the Census Bureau for May 2014 for manufacturing, wholesale, and retail:
