Advance retail sales for July rose 0.4%, compared to the forecast that called for an increase of 0.5%, but June’s 0.5% drop was revised to a 0.3% decline. Sales ex-autos and gas declined 0.1% in July, versus the 0.1% increase that was anticipated.
The Consumer Price Index showed prices at the consumer level were up 0.3% in July month-over-month, above the forecast 0.2% gain by economists, after dipping 0.1% in June. Meanwhile, the core rate, which strips out food and energy, increased 0.1% in July, after rising 0.2% in June, matching estimates. On a year-over-year basis, consumer prices were up 1.2% in July and the core CPI was 0.9% higher year over year.
The preliminary University of Michigan’s Consumer Sentiment Index rose more than forecast, improving from 67.8 in July to 69.6 for August, above the increase to 69.0 that was expected.
Business inventories rose 0.3% month over month in June, just above the 0.2% increase that was expected, and May’s 0.1% increase was revised to a 0.2% gain. Sales dropped 0.6%, and the inventory-to-sales ratio—the amount of time it would take to deplete inventories at the current sales pace—inched back up to 1.26 from 1.25 months in May.
