Highlights

Business inventories growth was flat for a second consecutive month in March. The Briefing.com consensus expected business inventories to increase 0.3%.

Key Factors

Inventory growth from manufacturers (0.0%) and merchant wholesalers (0.4%) was known prior to the release. The only new information was that retailer inventories declined 0.5% in March after increasing 0.2% in February.
Inventory levels fell in furniture (-3.3%), apparel (-0.8%), and motor vehicles and parts dealers (-0.3%). All of the other retail sectors were flat. No sector increased its inventory levels in March.
Total business sales declined 1.1% in March, which completely offset the 1.0% increase in sales in February.
The inventory-to-sales ratio increased to 1.29 from 1.28.

Business inventories include wholesale inventories, manufacturing inventories, and retail inventories. Inventories are a component of GDP, and thus are of interest to economists, but the financial markets don't pay much attention to this release. Over the long term, the inventory-to-sales ratio has been declining, due to improving techniques for inventory management. Inventories are likely to decline over the near term to bring inventory-to-sales ratios back into line with company desires. Inventories will rise once sales pick up.

Category	MAR	FEB	JAN	DEC	NOV
Inventories	0.0%	0.0%	0.9%	0.3%	0.2%
Manufacturers	0.0%	0.2%	0.6%	0.0%	0.0%
Retailers	-0.5%	0.2%	1.4%	0.8%	0.3%
Wholesalers	0.4%	-0.3%	0.8%	0.1%	0.4%
Sales	-1.1%	1.0%	-0.1%	0.1%	0.9%
Manufacturers	-1.0%	0.4%	0.4%	0.0%	0.3%
Retailers	-0.6%	1.3%	0.0%	0.4%	0.4%
Wholesalers	-1.6%	1.5%	-0.8%	0.0%	2.2%
Inventory/Sales	1.29	1.28	1.29	1.28	1.28
Manufacturers	1.29	1.27	1.28	1.27	1.27
Retailers	1.39	1.39	1.40	1.38	1.38
Wholesalers	1.21	1.19	1.21	1.19	1.19