The US Census Bureau announced today the combined value of distributive trade sales and manufacturers’ shipments for January, adjusted for seasonal and trading day differences but not for price changes, was estimated at $1,568.5 billion, up 4.7 percent (±0.3 percent) from December 2020 and up 7.1 percent (±0.4 percent) from January 2020.
Manufacturers’ and trade inventories for January, adjusted for seasonal variations but not for price changes, were estimated at an end-of-month level of $1,982.4 billion, up 0.3 percent (±0.1 percent) from December 2020, but were down 1.8 percent (±0.3 percent) from January 2020.
The total business inventories/sales ratio based on seasonally adjusted data at the end of January was 1.26. The January 2020 ratio was 1.38.