Wholesale Inventories Dip 0.8%, Sales Up 0.2% in May

Merchant wholesalers posted a 0.8% decrease in inventories in May, while sales rose a tepid 0.2% in the month, according to data released by the Commerce Department.

Inventories of merchant wholesalers slid to $402.2 billion following a revised 1.3% decrease to $405.6 billion in April, originally reported as a 1.4% decrease to $405.4 billion.

Meanwhile, sales of merchant wholesalers rose to about $311.3 billion in May after April’s unrevised, unchanged figure of $310.7 billion.

Economists polled by Thomson Reuters predicted a 1.0 decrease in wholesale inventories.

Inventories were off 7.6% from May 2008, when they were at $435.3 billion, while year-over-year sales posted a 19.9% slump from $388.4 billion.

The inventories to sales ratio was 1.29, off from 1.31 in April and up from 1.12 a year ago.

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