• Main
  • Analytics
  • Market News
  • Canada’s producer prices decline 0.8 per cent in August
Economic news
20.09.2024

Canada’s producer prices decline 0.8 per cent in August

Statistics Canada announced on Friday that the Industrial Product Price Index (IPPI) declined 0.8 per cent m-o-m in August, following a downwardly revised 0.1 per cent m-o-m fall (from unchanged m-o-m) in the previous month. This represented the steepest monthly decrease since December 2023 (-1.6 per cent m-o-m).

Economists had forecast the IPPI to drop 0.3 per cent m-o-m in August.

According to the report, the August fall in the headline indicator was due to decreases in 11 out of 21 product categories, driven by energy and petroleum products (-5.0 per cent m-o-m), meat, fish and dairy products (-1.7 per cent m-o-m), and primary non-ferrous metal products (-1.6 per cent m-o-m). Meanwhile, the lumber and other wood products (+2.1 per cent m-o-m), chemicals and chemical products (+1.0 per cent m-o-m), and textile and leather products (+0.8 per cent m-o-m) categories posted the biggest gains.

In y-o-y terms, the IPPI went up 0.2 per cent in August, following a downwardly revised 2.8 per cent jump (from +2.9 per cent) in July. This was the weakest annual increase since a decline in March (-0.5 per cent). 

The report also unveiled that the prices of raw materials purchased by manufacturers operating in Canada, as measured by the Raw Materials Price Index (RMPI), plunged 3.1 per cent m-o-m in August after an unrevised 0.7 per cent m-o-m gain in the previous month. Economists had forecast a 2.0 per cent m-o-m drop. The tumble in RMPI was primarily led by a decrease in costs of crude energy products (-5.0 per cent m-o-m).

On a y-o-y basis, the RMPI fell 2.5 per cent, following an unrevised 4.1 per cent surge in July. This represented the first annual decrease since February (-4.7 per cent).

See also