Wholesale trade bounces back in July
“The weakness in the index was concentrated in the housing index and the stock market, both of which fell more than the month before,”the agency said.
OTTAWA — Canada’s wholesale sector bounced back in July after a flat performance the previous month, Statistics Canada said Tuesday.
Wholesale sales rose 0.8% during the month to $48.2-billion. That follows an unchanged reading in June, which the federal agency revised from a 0.2% gain.
“Although five of the seven sub-sectors, representing more than 85% of total sales, reported increases, most of the growth was concentrated in the machinery, equipment and supplies, the personal and household goods, and the motor vehicle and parts subsector,”the agency said.
The July wholesale figure was in line with economists’ forecasts.
Emanuella Enenajor, an economist at CIBC World Market, said the wholesale report points “to a positive contribution to the month’s GDP — along with an early bounce back in manufacturing activity.”
Meanwhile, another Statistics Canada report on Tuesday showed a major barometer of the country’s economic health —the index of leading indicators — was little changed in August. Economists had expected an increase on about 0.2% for the month.
“The weakness in the index was concentrated in the housing index and the stock market, both of which fell more than the month before,”the agency said.
The agency also revised its July index reading to a 0.1% gain, from a previous estimate of a 0.2% increase.
The Canadian economy contracted 0.4% in the second quarter of this year, with much of that decline attributed to supply chain disruptions due mainly to the earthquake and tsunami in Japan.
Still, the Bank of Canada said in its most recent monetary policy statement that “growth will resume in the second half of this year.” The central bank has also forecast economic growth in Canada of 2.9% in 2011 and 2.6% in 2012.