The Commerce
Department announced on Thursday that the U.S. business inventories remained unchanged m-o-m in January
2024, following a downwardly revised 0.3 per cent m-o-m climb (from +0.4 per cent
m-o-m) in December 2023. That was worse than economists’ forecast of a 0.2
per cent m-o-m advance.
According to
the report, stocks at retailers increased 0.4 per cent m-o-m in January while inventories
at merchant wholesalers fell 0.3 per cent m-o-m, and those at manufacturers slipped
0.1 per cent m-o-m.
In y-o-y terms,
business inventories moved up 0.4 per cent in January.