2017.11.1510:21:00UTC+00U.S. Business Inventories Unchanged As Expected In September

With a drop in retail inventories offsetting increases in manufacturing and wholesale inventories, the Commerce Department released a report on Wednesday showing U.S. business inventories were unchanged in the month of September.

The Commerce Department said business inventories were flat in September after climbing by a revised 0.6 percent in August.

Economists had expected business inventories to come in unchanged compared to the 0.7 percent increase originally reported for the previous month.

The report said retail inventories fell by 0.9 percent, while manufacturing inventories climbed by 0.7 percent and wholesale inventories rose by 0.3 percent.

Meanwhile, the Commerce Department said business sales surged up by 1.4 percent in September after rising by 0.8 percent in August.

Retail sales soared by 2.1 percent and wholesale sales jumped by 1.3 percent, while manufacturing sales increased by 0.8 percent.

With sales jumping and inventories unchanged, the inventories-to-sales ratio dropped to 1.36 in September from 1.38 in August.